


Whumptober 2020

by redrobinhood



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Whump, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:01:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 32
Words: 31,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26743291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redrobinhood/pseuds/redrobinhood
Summary: Whumptober 2020 participation.Individual stories have their own warnings listed with them in chapter and in index. Main characters and pairings are tagged in order of character prevalence. All information, including characters, pairings, warnings, descriptions, etc., is indexed.
Relationships: Barriss Offee & Ahsoka Tano, CC-2224 | Cody & CT-7567 | Rex, CC-2224 | Cody & Obi-Wan Kenobi, CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi, CC-5052 | Bly/Aayla Secura, CT-21-0408 | Echo & CT-27-5555 | Fives | ARC-5555, CT-5597 | Jesse & CT-6116 | Kix, CT-7567 | Rex & Ahsoka Tano, CT-7567 | Rex & Anakin Skywalker, Cal Kestis & Merrin, Plo Koon & CC-3636 | Wolffe, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Riyo Chuchi/CC-1010 | Fox
Comments: 91
Kudos: 209
Collections: Randomness, Whumptober 2020





	1. Index

**Author's Note:**

> So as to not clog up the AO3 tags, and so as to provide the best reading experience, the index is a summary of every work included and lists out the all characters, pairings, additional tags, triggers, and level of whump so that you may make an informed decision about what you would like to read. Feel free to ask questions in the comments, or for more summary/description if you are unsure if you would like to approach something. I can also be reached on Tumblr at redrobinhoood (three os) if you’d like to DM me.
> 
> Index has been finalized as of Oct 31st.

* Lighter whump

** Eek but they at least kinda get their shit together

*** I kill or graphically traumatize someone here

**Single-character focus**

No 31. TODAY’S SPECIAL: TORTURE **

  * Left for Dead
  * TW: None
  * Boba Fett
  * Description: Left to die, Boba Fett refuses to do so.



No 19. BROKEN HEARTS ***

  * Grief | Mourning Loved One | Survivor’s Guilt
  * TW: Character Death, Depression
  * CC-5052 | Bly / Aayla Secura
  * CC-5052 | Bly. CT-6734 | Galle, CC-3636 | Wolffe, Aayla Secura
  * Description: Bly finds himself in the same situation that he once put Aayla in when he returns to Felucia.



No 1. LET’S HANG OUT SOMETIME*

  * Waking Up Restrained | Shackled | Hanging
  * TW: Psychological Trauma
  * CC-2224 | Cody. CT-7567 | Rex, Alexsandr Kallus, Sabine Wren
  * Additional tags: Retrospective
  * Description: Captured by the Rebel Alliance, Cody thinks back on the events that led to this moment.



No 25. I THINK I’LL JUST COLLAPSE RIGHT HERE, THANKS **

  * Disorientation | Blurred Vision
  * TW: Graphic Descriptions
  * CT-5555 | Fives & CT-0408 | Echo
  * CT-0408 | Echo
  * Additional tags: Canon compliant
  * Description: Echo makes a mistake at the Citadel and waits for Fives to save him from it.



No 26. IF YOU THOUGHT THE HEAD TRAUMA WAS BAD… **

  * Migraine
  * TW: None
  * CT-0408 | Echo & CT-5555 | Fives, & CT-7567 | Rex
  * CT-0408 | Echo, CT-7567 | Rex
  * Additional tags: Canon compliant
  * Description: Trapped inside his own mind, Echo relives his final moments of freedom.



No 28. SUCH WOW. MANY NORMAL. VERY OOPS. ***

  * Accidents
  * TW: Character Death, Graphic Descriptions
  * CT-5597 | Jesse & CT-6116 Kix
  * CT-5597 | Jesse
  * Additional tags: Canon compliant
  * Description: Pinned down, Jesse thinks back on the events leading up to Order 66.



No 20. TOTO, I HAVE A FEELING WE’RE NOT IN KANSAS ANYMORE ***

  * Field Medicine
  * TW: Needles, Drug Use
  * CT-6116 | Kix. CT-5597 | Jesse
  * Description: Kix fights to keep his brothers alive on Umbara, but gives them peace when he cannot do so.



No 14. IS SOMETHING BURNING? ** 

  * Branding 
  * TW: None 
  * CC-4477 | Thire. Jek 
  * Description: Thire finds that the Emperor has found a solution for telling the identical clones apart. 



No 8. WHERE DID EVERYBODY GO? ***

  * Abandoned | Isolation
  * TW: Death, Depression, Graphic Descriptions of Violence
  * CT-7567 | Rex. Ahsoka Tano
  * Additional Tags: Post Victory and Death
  * Description: Rex returns to the wreckage of the Venator once Ahsoka falls asleep to mourn his brothers.



No 29. I THINK I NEED A DOCTOR *

  * Intubation | Reluctant Bedrest
  * TW: Mentions of Death
  * CC-3636 | Wolffe. Boost
  * Description: After suffering serious injuries at the hands of the droid army, Wolffe finds himself on the road to recovery.



**Friendship focus/pairings**

No 15. INTO THE UNKNOWN **

  * Possession | Alt 10. Nightmares
  * TW: Violence, Implied Character Death
  * Barriss Offee & Ahsoka Tano
  * Barriss Offee, Ahsoka Tano
  * Description: Ahsoka dreams about Barriss Offee and the tipping points in their friendship.



No 24. YOU’RE NOT MAKING ANY SENSE *

  * Sensory Deprivation
  * TW: None
  * Barriss Offee & Ahsoka Tano
  * Barriss Offee, Ahsoka Tano
  * Description: Imprisoned for her crimes, Barriss tries to sort fact from fiction as she finds herself deprived of her senses.



No 7. I’VE GOT YOU *

  * Support | Enemy to Caretaker
  * TW: Wounds
  * Cal Kestis & Merrin
  * Cal Kestis, Merrin
  * Additional notes: Fallen Order Spoilers
  * Description: Merrin goes to see Cal with thoughts of Dathomir on her mind.



No 18. PANIC! AT THE DISCO **

  * Panic Attacks
  * TW: Panic Attacks
  * Cal Kestis & BD-1, & Merrin
  * Cal Kestis, BD-1, Merrin
  * Description: With all distractors gone, Cal’s thoughts wander to old trauma and old wounds.



No 12. I THINK I’VE BROKEN SOMETHING *

  * Broken Down | Broken Trust
  * TW: None
  * CC-2224 | Cody & Obi-Wan Kenobi
  * CC-2224 | Cody, Obi-Wan Kenobi, _Ghost_ Crew (all), _Millennium Falcon_ crew (almost all)
  * Additional tags:
  * Description: The _Ghost_ receives a transmission concerning a former Jedi, a farm boy, and the Death Star.



No 30. NOW WHERE DID THAT COME FROM? ***

  * Internal Organ Injury
  * TW: Character Death, Graphic Descriptions, Blood
  * CC-2224 | Cody & CT-7567 | Rex
  * CC-2224 | Cody, CT-7567 | Rex
  * Description: Cody tells Rex of a new Separatist weapon. Later, Rex comes face to face with it.



No 4. RUNNING OUT OF TIME**

  * Collapsed Building
  * TW: Blood, Mentions of Death
  * CT-27-5555 | Fives | ARC-5555, CT-5385 | Tup, CT-6116 | Kix, CT-5597 | Jesse. CT-7567 | Rex, Anakin Skywalker
  * Description: Rex sends some of his best men to steal data from a recently abandoned Separatist base.



No 13. BREATHE IN BREATHE OUT *

  * Oxygen Mask 
  * TW: None 
  * Plo Koon & CC-3636 | Wolffe 
  * Plo Koon, CC-3636 | Wolffe 
  * Description: Captured during the infiltration of a Separatist base, Plo Koon chooses to save the lives of his men over his own. 



No 23. WHAT’S A WHUMPEE GOTTA DO TO GET SOME SLEEP AROUND HERE? *

  * Exhaustion | Sleep Deprivation
  * TW: Depression
  * CT-5555 | Fives & CT-0408 | Echo, & CT-5385 | Tup
  * CT-5555 | Fives, CT-5385 | Tup
  * Description: Following Umbara, old nightmares come back to haunt Fives.



No 2. IN THE HANDS OF THE ENEMY **

  * “Pick Who Dies” | Collars
  * TW: None
  * CT-7567 | Rex & Anakin Skywalker
  * Anakin Skywalker, Ahsoka Tano, CT-7567 | Rex, Obi-Wan Kenobi
  * Description: Anakin is forced to choose between three of the beings he loves.



No 16. A TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY

  * Hallucinations
  * TW: None
  * CT-7567 | Rex & Anakin Skywalker
  * CT-7567 | Rex, Anakin Skywalker
  * Description: Rex and Anakin find themselves doused with hallucinogenic powder while pursuing Asajj Ventress.



No 9. FOR THE GREATER GOOD ***

  * “Take Me Instead” | “Run!”
  * TW: Character Death
  * CT 7567 | Rex & Ahsoka Tano
  * CT 7567 | Rex, Ahsoka Tano. CT-6116 | Kix, Anakin Skywalker
  * Description: When their ship comes under attack, Rex and Ahsoka desperately try to hold off the droids from the control room.



No 21. I DON’T FEEL SO WELL *

  * Hypothermia
  * TW: None
  * CT-7567 | Rex & Ahsoka Tano
  * CT-7567 | Rex, Ahsoka Tano. Anakin Skywalker, CC-2224 | Cody, Obi-Wan Kenobi
  * Description: Rex and Ahsoka find themselves stranded on an ice moon after escaping from Separatist forces.



**Romance pairings**

No 5. WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU’RE GOING? ***

  * On the Run | Failed Escape
  * TW: Character Death
  * CC-5052 | Bly / Aayla Secura
  * CC-5052 | Bly, Aayla Secura, CT-6734 | Galle
  * Additional tags: Worse Than Canon
  * Description: Bly decides to take the execution of Order 66 into his own hands



No 27. OK, WHO HAD NATURAL DISASTERS ON THEIR 2020 BINGO CARD? **

  * Earthquake
  * TW: Suicide
  * CC-5052 | Bly / Aayla Secura
  * CC-5052 | Bly, Aayla Secura
  * Description: Trapped by a collapsed building during an earthquake, Bly and Aayla take different approaches to their survival.



No 6. PLEASE…. **

  * “Get it Out” | “Stop, please”
  * TW: Blood, Mentions of Death
  * CC-2224 | Cody / Obi-Wan Kenobi
  * CC-2224 | Cody, Obi-Wan Kenobi
  * Description: Obi-Wan and Cody lead a mission to scout out what appears to be an abandoned Separatist base.



No 17. I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING *

  * Blackmail | Dirty Secret
  * TW: None
  * Rey / Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
  * Rey, Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
  * Description: A reminiscing Kylo Ren is interrupted by a call for a momentary truce following the near extermination of the Resistance.



No 3. MY WAY OR THE HIGHWAY*

  * Manhandled | Held at Gunpoint
  * TW: None
  * Riyo Chuchi / CC-1010 | Fox
  * Riyo Chuchi, CC-1010 | Fox. CC-5869 | Stone
  * Description: It’s the weekly bounty hunter break in in the Senate. But this week, Commander Fox finds Senator Chuchi to be one of their demands.



No 10. THEY LOOK SO PRETTY WHEN THEY BLEED **

  * Blood Loss | Trail of Blood
  * TW: Blood, Graphic Descriptions, Character Death
  * Riyo Chuchi / CC-1010 | Fox
  * Riyo Chuchi, CC-1010 | Fox.
  * Description: Commander Fox leads an assault on a team of bounty hunters who have infiltrated the Senate.



No 11. PSYCH 101 *** 

  * Defiance | Struggling | Crying 
  * TW: Character Death 
  * Riyo Chuchi / CC-1010 | Fox
  * Riyo Chuchi, CC-1010 | Fox
  * Description: The Chancellor learns of Commander Fox and Riyo’s relationship and orders his property to be destroyed.



No 22. DO THESE TACOS TASTE FUNNY TO YOU? *

  * Poisoned
  * TW: None
  * Riyo Chuchi / CC-1010 | Fox
  * Riyo Chuchi, CC-4477 | Thire
  * Description: Thire watches over Riyo at a senatorial gathering after she receives another threat on her life.




	2. No 1. LET’S HANG OUT SOMETIME

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Captured by the Rebel Alliance, Cody thinks back on the events that led to this moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Waking Up Restrained | Shackled | Hanging  
> TW: Psychological Trauma
> 
> Let’s start out with some soft, implied psychological whump.
> 
> The Hanged Man: Pause, surrender, letting go.

Cody tested the restraints around his wrists. He moved his hands up and down, spun them around, tugged until his thumb neared the breaking point. He decided that he could’ve gotten out of them if he tried. But he didn’t. It wasn’t worth the effort.

It had been a routine patrol. Routine enough that Cody had been permitted to go out into the field with the men he had once trained. They still hated him. At the time, it had been mutual, but over time, Cody’s resentment had softened. Perhaps, his anger had been misplaced. Or perhaps, he’d found a better outlet for it than fresh eighteen-year-olds. He’d never hated all of them. Elkon, the once-boy who had taken such an interest in the clone commander. Cody had a soft spot for him. Enough of a soft spot to trade himself for the boy, now man, when they had been ambushed by the Rebel Alliance.

Cody hated the stormtroopers, but he was still their commander.

They’d tried to hold the Rebels off. Cody had been right there with them as they fell back to the ship. Then there was no ship, and Cody had found himself lying beside the bodies of the men who had gathered around him in the early days of the Empire to hear stories of the Clone Wars. He had been aware of someone crouching over him, waving a blaster at the approaching Rebels, then finally laying it down in surrender to prevent Cody from being caught in the crossfire. He’d learned later that that had been Elkon when Cody had been dragged before the Alliance High Command. There, Cody had bartered the lives of his remaining men for the information inside his head. He had a near perfect memory. He knew where each ship in the Imperial Navy was at any given time, the ones undergoing repairs, the movement of troops from planet to planet, the layouts of their buildings, their bases, their factories. He knew of what was abandoned, available for scavenging, and how to get around the still-functioning security systems. There were only four things Cody didn’t know. He didn’t know why the Empire was collecting kyber, he didn’t know why he had been ordered to muster a million stormtroopers, he didn’t know where they were going, and he didn’t know why he had killed Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Before he could slip back into that particular void, the door to his cell slid open and a young woman in Mandalorian armor stepped inside.

“You’re Commander Cody.” It wasn’t a question.

“CC-2224.” He corrected. He didn’t feel like Cody.

She didn’t falter. “You said that you would help us.”

“Yes.”

“Well, I want to help you.”

Cody raised his eyebrows in feigned surprise. He’d expected something like this. “Let me guess, you want me to join your rebellion because the Empire is evil, and they’ve been manipulating me all this time.”

The woman’s lips quirked into a smile. “You said that, not me. I want your permission for a surgery. I’d like to take your inhibitor chip out.”

Cody let himself sink into the cuffs as he considered the offer. At the mention of the inhibitor chip, he remembered standing amongst stone cliffs with the scent of burning metals and blaster bolts in the air. He remembered the sudden apathy that had overtaken him. He remembered the fall. It hadn’t been a real fall, his body hadn’t moved as it happened, but his mind had slipped off the edge of a void and he had known then that he would never escape. As Obi-Wan Kenobi fell into the sinkholes of Utapau, Cody fell into CC-2224.

“Commander?” The Mandalorian prompted after a minute of silence.

“Take it out.” He hissed before he could change his mind.

* * *

He never had been able to climb back out of the void. It had happened time and time again. He’d received orders that he could not refuse. Massacres, entire villages wiped out at his command, by his hands. He’d taken solace in the fact that he would soon die or age out of service, then they had started the experimental treatments and the rapid aging been reversed and then stopped. He was thirty-two years old, he should’ve been in his sixties by now, or dead, like so many of his brothers. Instead, Cody found himself waking up in an unfamiliar medical facility with an unfamiliar man at his side but with some all-too-familiar bindings across his body.

“How do you feel?” A voice said on his other side.

Cody turned his head over slowly to find the speaker. “Agent Kallus.”

“Marshall Commander, welcome to the Rebellion.”

Cody shook his head. “I’m not a Rebel.”

“Then we’ll make you into one.” The man on Cody’s left spoke.

Cody slowly turned his head back over to look at the man. Cody hadn’t seen one of his brothers in years, but he knew that voice. The voice of all of those who had gotten out. “You don’t know what I’ve done.”

“Well, I hid out in the middle of nowhere for fifteen years and hunted joopas.”

Cody took a deep, shaky breath as he took in the man’s armor. “I thought you were dead.”

“Can’t get rid of me that easily, Codes.” Rex reached down and squeezed Cody’s hand.

“Rex, the things they made me do. You don’t know me anymore.”

“I know that you’re still my brother. And that’s all that matters.” Rex reached over and began to undo the bindings holding Cody down. When they were all gone, Rex and Kallus reached over to help Cody to his feet, steadying him as he swayed.

“Easy.” Kallus said as he slipped his arm under Cody’s to support him. Out of everyone Cody had worked with in the Empire, Kallus had been the last person that he would have expected to be part of his welcome committee to the Rebel Alliance. Not that he minded. They’d worked well together in the past.

“It’s really gone?” Cody asked, turning to look at Rex.

“Yes.” Rex smiled reassuringly, and Cody knew at once that he would be okay. Maybe he could never crawl out of the void that the chip had left behind, but perhaps he could take some time to halt his fall and rest on a ledge. That would be good.


	3. No 2. IN THE HANDS OF THE ENEMY

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anakin is forced to choose between three of the beings he loves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Pick Who Dies” | Collars  
> TW: None

Rex slowly rolled his head around in a circle, looking to ease some of the strain that the heavy collar left around his neck. It had been hours, how many he didn’t know, but certainly hours. As he finished the roll, he could see Ahsoka on his right scratching the back of her headtails against the metal.

“I thought Anakin would be here by now.” Obi-Wan remarked on Rex’s left. “He sure is taking his sweet time.”

“Well, Rex and I are usually there to keep him on track.” Ahsoka scoffed.

Rex would’ve been worried if he had been alone. But he wasn’t. The room wasn’t dark enough to prevent him from seeing the Jedi in their respective ray shields on each side and their presence brought him comfort. He just didn’t want to be on the other end of the lightsaber when they were freed.

Obi-Wan made a sound as if he was going to respond but fell silent at the sound of approaching footsteps. The door to the warehouse slid open and Anakin and a Phindian walked in. The Phindian flipped on the lights as they entered, and Rex found himself blinking as his eyes adjusted to the light.

“Just as Moralo Eval said.” The Phindian gestured to the prisoners.

“And what do you want from me?” Anakin’s eyes danced across the room in search of traps.

“Just your cooperation. See the collars around their necks? At the touch of this button,” the Phindian waved a remote before him, “they will produce a lethal shock.”

“Tell me why I shouldn’t gut you now.” Anakin growled, resting his hand on his lightsaber hilt.

“Because if I die, they all die.” Eval bared his teeth in what may have been a smile. “But you have a choice, Skywalker. You get the wonderful opportunity to pick the two who survive.”

“You want me to kill someone?” Anakin’s voice rose and his grip on his lightsaber tightened.

“Patience, Skywalker. You must play the game.”

Anakin threw his fist away from his hilt in rage and stepped towards the trio. His eyes scanned across them, coming to stop at Ahsoka. “Let Ahsoka go.” He commanded.

Eval nodded and the lights on Ahsoka’s collar powered off, the ray shield above her falling away. She stood up and stumbled over to Anakin, who stepped forward to steady her and pull her against his side as he turned back to the men.

Rex took a deep breath. Of course Anakin would free Ahsoka- hell, he’d wanted him to free Ahsoka- but Rex knew what would happen next. He hoped that it wouldn’t, but he also knew that he was only a clone. Obi-Wan had practically raised Anakin, he was like a brother to him. Eval had presented Anakin with a choice that never existed.

Anakin’s face contorted into a look of pain. “Let Obi-Wan go.”

Rex’s chest tightened in pain, and maybe a little bit of fear. When Anakin looked to him, Rex nodded to let him know it was okay. Rex had known that he’d be the one to die. He’d already forgiven Anakin for it. He looked over to Ahsoka, frozen in horror at Anakin’s side. He wished that she wasn’t here to see this. Rex knew that he could never protect Ahsoka from the horrors of war, but this was not the war. This was the revenge of a madman.

“Very well.” Eval said.

Rex closed his eyes. He didn’t want to see the looks on his friends faces as he died. Once he had hoped that he would die in battle, in the arms of one of his brothers or his Jedi. He thought for sure that that was to be his fate, to die in combat for the Republic. But this was an execution, not a battle, and he wished now that he could die here alone.

Rex heard the sound of the collar buzzing to life and clenched his jaw. No matter how much it would hurt, Ahsoka could never know. That thought was gone the moment the electricity began to surge through his body. All his thoughts were gone, burned away by the burst of current that flowed through him. He could feel his muscles contracting as the electric fields governing his body went haywire. He might have cried out in pain. If he did, it was lost to him. Then it stopped and dying felt very painful as he slammed into the duracrete floor, his body convulsing. One half of the collar lay before him, broken, and Rex suddenly realized that he was not dead.

There was shouting and a commotion, but he couldn’t process the sounds over the erratic beating of his heart in his ears. However, he did feel the small arms that wrapped around his body and the flesh of the lekku pressing against his head as Ahsoka pulled him into her arms. He wanted to order her to put him down. His muscles still twitched uncontrollably, and he didn’t want his jerking limbs to hurt her. But he couldn’t raise his voice to say it and the touch of skin was better than that of duracrete. So instead he closed his eyes and tried to get his breathing under control. Ahsoka was slowly rubbing a hand up and down his back and he tried to time his breath to the movement.

“Rex?” Ahsoka’s voice shook and he felt her take his wrist into her free hand. She must’ve thought she’d lost him when his eyes closed.

It took all of Rex’s strength to open his eyes again, and more to force the words past his lips. “‘M alright, kid.”

Ahsoka let out a sob of relief and moved her hand down from his wrist to tangle their fingers together. He couldn’t feel her touch but tried to give her hand a reassuring squeeze anyways.

“Rex!” Rex didn’t have to turn around to know that it was Anakin crashing to his knees behind him.

“Gen’ral.” Rex greeted. He was starting to feel tired again.

“Let’s get him back to the ship.” Anakin slipped his arms under Rex, taking him from Ahsoka’s grip. Rex let his head loll against Anakin’s chest as the man stood. He knew that he would be okay. There was a medical droid on the ship, any damage he had sustained from the shock would be treated. But at the same time, Rex thought that he may have rather died. He had been raised knowing that he was an expendable pawn for the Republic, but he’d never thought that he would become an expendable pawn to his general. Though it was silly to think that his life had any value equal to that of a Jedi. Still, for a moment, Rex wished he had died so that he wouldn’t have to live with this knowledge. Then he felt something wet hit his face and blinked open his eyes to find that his general was crying as he carried him.

“Anakin.” Rex rasped.

“Just hang in there, Rex.” He sounded desperate.

“I forgive you.”

Anakin didn’t verbally respond, but Rex felt his general’s grip on his body tighten. Rex closed his eyes again and focused on his still erratic heartbeat. They would talk later. Now, Rex felt safe in the presence of his Jedi.


	4. No 3. MY WAY OR THE HIGHWAY

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s the weekly bounty hunter break in in the Senate. But this week, Commander Fox finds Senator Chuchi to be one of their demands.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Manhandled | Held at Gunpoint  
> TW: None
> 
> Already broke my posting at midnight streak because oh man was I tired yesterday.

Commander Fox of the Coruscant Guard looked slowly up at the now-flashing light on the console beside him that indicated an emergency. He pressed his hand to his forehead and took a deep breath, enjoying the last few seconds of calm before one of his brothers busted down his door. It was only a few seconds later when Kilo burst into his office.

“Sir!”

Fox took another deep breath and slowly raised his head. “Yes?”

“Bounty hunters in the auditorium.”

“Demands?”

“The Senators from Kuat, Lorrd, Humbarine, and Pantora.”

Fox shot to his feet, reaching for his helmet. “Senator Chuchi?”

“Yes.” Kilo looked down to his feet then back up at Fox. “Isn’t that your girl, sir?”

“Shut up.” Fox shouldered Kilo out of the way, much to the other man’s amusement, as he strode into the main office.

“Already sent some lieutenants to escort the senators to saferooms.” Commander Stone was leaning over the back of a chair by the security console. He kept his eyes fixed on the screen as Fox approached. “I’ve got three of the boys ready for you. I want you four checking in on the senators over the course of the ordeal. The Senate Guard will be engaging the bounty hunters, but I have a squad at the ready for when they ultimately fail. Thire’s with the Chancellor.”

“What would I do without you?” Fox shook his head as he donned his helmet and nodded to the three men waiting behind Stone.

Stone waved them off. “More paperwork.”

They found Senator Danu first. Then they found Alavar, then Breemu, working their way from the saferoom nearest to the Guard offices to the one furthest. At each room, Fox left one of his men behind to stand guard in addition to the lieutenants already present. The poor senators looked like they needed them more than he did. Because of this, Fox was alone when he found the empty saferoom that should have housed Senator Chuchi and the dead lieutenant who had been guarding her.

“ _Haar’chak_.” He hissed under his breath. Maybe he should have kept the men with him. He bit back a rise of fear and anger in his gut. He would have to remain professional if he was to keep Riyo safe.

“Go down the hall, take the third right. You’ll see them.” Stone’s voice came over Fox’s comm. Of course, he was watching the security monitors. “Want backup?”

“If you can spare the men.” Fox drew one of his blasters and strode down the hall. Maker forbid he run into one of the bounty hunters on his way to Riyo. They would regret it.

Stone had been right. When Fox rounded the corner into the third hallway he found a Mirialan trying to drag a rather indignant Senator Chuchi. Riyo had dug her heels into the floor and had managed to snag them into a seam in the carpet. She was refusing to move, cursing up a storm of Pantoran insults that Fox knew well from the time she’d caught her finger on the stove burner. Fox shoved down another burst of fear and anger as he noticed the scratch marks down one of her arms. He wondered why the bounty hunter hadn’t just stunned her already, considering the fight she was giving him.

Fox raised his blaster. “Let her go.”

The bounty hunter turned around and snarled, bringing out his own blaster and firing at Fox. The shots went wild, and Fox managed to clip the bounty hunter in the shoulder in return. The Mirialan cursed and grabbed Riyo’s other arm, spinning her around before him and leveling his blaster at her head. “Put the blaster down, clone.”

Fox tried to pretend that it wasn’t Riyo, his Riyo, on the other end of the blaster. He handled it like he would any senatorial kidnapping. “You won’t do it.” Fox bluffed. “You have a bounty to fulfill, and I’m willing to bet that the deal’s off if she dies. You didn’t even risk stunning her.”

“Don’t try me!” But his hand was shaking, and his fingers stayed beside the trigger.

“Let her go.” Fox commanded again. “Attempted kidnapping of a senator and bodily harm to a senator are two very different charges.”

The Mirialan seemed to think it over for a moment, then he lowered his blaster and pulled the trigger. The shot went through her arm, and she bent over as she clutched her hand across the wound. Fox had never lowered his pistol, and the shot went through the center of the Mirialan’s forehead. Fox was by Riyo’s side before the bounty hunter had fully hit the ground.

“Belay backup, Stone. It’s over.” Fox allowed Riyo to lean against him as he fumbled in his belt for his medical kit.

“Does this count as two?” Riyo looked up at him with a pained smile.

Fox was glad that his helmet hid the confusion on his face. “What?”

“Does this count as two scars, or one?”

“Ri, y-.”

“So if this is two, I’ll count my burned finger as three, got a fourth surgical scar from when I was a kid, a fifth scar from when I fell out of that tree, also as a kid, that’s five. I do believe I’m catching up to you, Fox.”

“Riyo, this is a contest that I am perfectly fine winning.” He scoffed as he unwrapped a bacta patch.

“I am very competitive.” She winced as he applied the first patch. “Though, on second thought.”

Fox unwrapped the second patch. “That’s what I thought.” He stroked his hand down the length of her arm as he applied the other patch, hoping to distract her from the pain.

“I knew you’d come for me, you know.” She raised her arm slightly so that his hand fell into her palm. Her lips broke into a beaming smile. “Of all the clones, I knew it would be you.”

“Stone’s watching us.” Fox cautioned.

Riyo’s smile widened and she reached up to remove Fox’s helmet, setting it aside. “So?” She leaned up into him, swaying a little as she tried to keep weight off her injured arm. “Oxytocin release relieves pain, you’d really be helping me.”

Fox sighed and leaned down to meet her lips, setting a hand against her waist to steady her. He really hoped that Stone was looking at another screen at the moment, knowing that that hope was in vain and Stone would be watching his every move. Bets were probably being cashed in even now. He pushed the thought out of his head and raised his free arm to the nape of Riyo’s neck, tangling his fingers into her hair. If he was going down, he might as well sink the entire ship with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To anyone who is also following 'no choir', I'm getting the next chapter together this weekend. I haven't forsaken it for Whumptober.


	5. No 4. RUNNING OUT OF TIME

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rex sends some of his best men to steal data from a recently abandoned Separatist base.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Collapsed Building  
> TW: Blood, Mentions of Death
> 
> Back on the midnight train. Y’all if there are ever any typos please call me right out so that I can fix them. My proofreading for these has been less effective than usual.

Fives blinked dust out of his eyes as he came to. He brought his right arm to his face and attempted to use just-as-dusty fingers to clean his eyes to no avail. He tried to bring his left arm up as well to see if it was any cleaner but found that it was trapped. He slowly raised his head to look down and found a durasteel beam laying across his torso, pinning his arm and hiding his legs behind it. He swore and let his head fell back to the floor.

“Fives?” A voice called somewhere on the other side of the beam.

“Tup? Is that you?”

“Yeah, it’s me. I got Jesse over here too. Only his left limbs are pinned, but his comm is busted.”

Fives looked down at his arm. “So’s mine. What about yours?”

“No clue. I’m totally pinned, Fives.”

Fives swore again and banged his hand against the beam. The pain shooting through his fingers did nothing to alleviate the situation. Rex had trusted him with this mission, and he had failed him. The control center had been right where their intel had said it would be, but their intel forgot to mention that it was rigged with explosives. Of the four men who had accompanied him, he had now only heard from two.

"Kix and the shiny?” Fives called back. There was silence from the other two men, and he assumed that they’d heard nothing.

“The rookie is dead.”

Fives tilted his head back to see Kix picking gingerly through the rubble. He’d managed to hold onto his helmet but had lost the armor plating on his left leg. Fives could see the sheen of blood coming through slashes in the blacks.

“Took a hit to the chest, nothing I could do.” Kix knelt down on Fives’ left side, running his hands over the beam. “Can you feel your legs, Fives?”

“Not really. Everything from the beam down is rather numb.

“We need to get this off. Have you heard from Tup or Jesse?”

“We’re on the other side of this junk!” Jesse called. “If you get me out, I won’t say ‘I told you so’ about the canyon earlier.”

Kix lay a hand on Fives’ shoulder. “I’ll be right back. If I can get one of them out, we may be able to lift this beam off you.”

Fives nodded and watched Kix scramble over the pile of rubble to the other side. He could hear Kix and Jesse talking, then the rubble shifted without warning and Fives cried out in pain as the beam sunk further into his chest. Not far, but far enough for him to hear a rib crack. Kix was at his side in a moment, now helmetless and with a wild look of fear on his face.

“Fives?”

“Get this damn thing off me.” Fives spat.

Kix nodded rapidly and called out for Jesse. When the other man had cautiously made his way over to Fives’ side of the rubble pile he slide his hands under Fives’ shoulders. Kix lifted the beam, and Fives groaned as Jesse pulled him clear of the debris.

“We’re going to need to carry him.” Kix said, his face drawn into an impassive look that Fives couldn’t read.

Fives tried to lift his head, but found he was unable to look down as Jesse slung him over his shoulders. He didn’t feel any different, but he was still numb from where the beam had once lain and down. He watched Jesse’s heels as he and Kix climbed back over the rubble, then he was being set down next to Tup, or at least, Tup’s helmet.

“Fives.” Tup’s helmet greeted.

“You weren’t kidding.” Fives chuckled, then he looked down and his sense of humor faded. The armor on his legs had held off most of the debris, though suffering some pretty drastic scouring, but his calves were soaked in blood from a piece of durasteel rebar that had pierced through the lower half of his right leg. He was amazed that it hadn’t been ripped out when Jesse had dragged him free of the debris, then glad that he couldn’t feel anything.

“Fives, hey, Fives, look at me.” Kix waved his hand in front of Fives’ face until Fives turned his attention to him. “I need you to not touch it, okay? You’ll be fine until it comes out. If you so much as tug on it you could bleed to death before help arrives.” Kix waited for Fives to nod in acknowledgment before he stood up and turned to Jesse. “Take my comm and try to find a signal. We’re gonna need a Jedi to get Tup out.”

After Jesse left, they sat in silence for a few minutes before Tup spoke. “Could you take my helmet off? It’s getting stuffy.”

“It’s not gonna help.” Fives chided as he obliged. With the helmet off, Tup’s hair was bared. Fives undid the hair tie holding it in a now messy bun and ran his fingers through Tup’s hair, rubbing in the fine dust that had settled around them. “You need a shower, kid.”

“I changed my mind, just leave me to die.” Tup sighed, blinking the dust that Fives had stirred up out of his eyes.

Fives scoffed and looked over to Kix, who had sat down and leaned against a support beam and was beginning to look pale. “Kix, you with us?”

“I’ll be fine.” Kix mumbled, closing his eyes.

"Kix? Kix!” Fives felt a terror rising in his chest. He couldn’t lose them. “Jesse!” But there was no response from him either and Fives wished fervently that Rex had come instead of him. He would’ve known what to do.

Fives and Tup sat in silence, neither one knowing what to say. Fives thought of Echo and how he must’ve felt in his last moments. For a moment, Fives considered ripping the rebar out of his leg and facing the consequences. But only for a moment. He wouldn’t leave Tup behind. Fives would do anything he could to keep Tup safe. He wasn’t a rookie anymore, but he would always be Fives’ little brother and Fives was determined to stand by him.

Fives wandering mind was brought back to his body by the sudden reappearance of Jesse with Captain Rex and General Skywalker at his side. Fives gave a sigh of relief at the sight of the squad of clones behind them.

“We’ve got medevac outside.” Anakin reassured him as he touched a hand to the rubble pinning Tup. “You did good, Fives.”

“General, we failed.”

“Rex only said to blow this place up. He didn’t mention any specifics.”

Fives chuckle turned into a moan of pain as Rex and Ridge slipped their arms around him and hauled him to his feet.

“I’ll make sure to be more detailed next time.” Rex said as he began to guide them out of the wreckage. When they were clear of what remained of the control center, Fives was amazed to find a waiting gunship with stretchers at the ready. Leaning heavily on Ridge and Rex he was able to pick his way over to the nearest stretcher on one leg and sink onto it. He groaned as Rex threw his legs up onto the stretcher. The numbness was starting to fade now that he was moving around.

“Rex, we couldn’t get any information from the database before it blew up. I’m sorry.”

Rex set a hand on Fives’ shoulder and squeezed it. “Don’t be. I’m proud of you.” Then he was being pushed away by the gunships accompanying medics. Once Rex was out of his sight, knowing that he would be safe, Fives allowed himself to finally pass out.


	6. No. 5. WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU’RE GOING?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bly decides to take the execution of Order 66 into his own hands

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the Run | Failed Escape  
> TW: Character Death
> 
> No chips AU? An indirect order isn’t as strongly felt AU? I don’t know. Up for interpretation.
> 
> Also, I was snooping on Bly’s Wookieepedia page and y’all he is smoking hot in the Republic comics. That artist did him well (and he has a scar over on eyebrow like hot damn why wasn’t that in Clone Wars).

Bly absentmindedly watched his general pick her way through the plant life of Felucia. He found his eyes wandering down to the small of her back, where he could watch her spine ripple with each step. What he wouldn’t give to lay his hands there as he held her to his chest, safe and warm. But they had a rule. No displays of affection on campaigns. Later, when they were back on the ship, he would wrap his arms around her and watch over her shoulder as she filled out debriefs, occasionally signing his number alongside her name. He loved those quiet moments more than anything else.

“Do you need a break, gentlemen?” Aayla turned back over her shoulder to her officers with a peaceful smile.

"Not yet.” One of the captains answered. “We can make it ‘til sunset.”

“Let me know if that changes.” She took a few more steps forward and stopped at the crest of the hill, the men coming to a halt behind her. Bly had only a few moments to take in the sight before his attention was drawn away by an approaching lieutenant.

“Sir,” Lieutenant Galle’s voice came over Bly’s helmet comm, “we’ve just received new orders. We are to execute clone protocol sixty-six.”

Bly’s hands were on his rifle before he’d finished registering what the lieutenant had said, then he froze. He’d begun to raise his gun without any feeling, any emotion at all towards Aayla, and some part of him knew that it wasn’t right. But he didn’t have time, they didn’t have time, if he didn’t kill her now his officers would. He was the best shot. It would be over in a moment. He had orders to kill her, and he was a good solider so he would follow those orders. His men were good soldiers, they would follow orders. Bly came to a decision. He would follow his orders, but he would give Aayla the opportunity to strike him down.

He spoke through the internal comms. “I’ll do it.” They would understand. Their affair was an open secret in the legion.

The men nodded and lowered their guns.

“General? Could I speak with you in private?”

Aayla turned her eyes away from the bird flying overheard to her commander. “Of course, Bly.” She followed him through the thick foliage until they were far out of the earshot or sight of their men. When Bly suddenly stopped, she took a few steps ahead to examine the new terrain. “Is there something wro-.” Her sentence ended in a cry of pain as a blaster bolt ripped through her side. She felt into the Force to sense the next shot and spun around to block it, sending it back at the man who had fired it. She gasped in horror as she watched the blaster rifle fall from Bly’s hands as he fell to his knees, clutching his leg.

“Bly!” Ignoring her own injury, she ran to his side and threw off his helmet, cupping his face in her hands. His eyes were unfocused, dull, and full of pain. She dared not look at her own reflection in them.

“You need to run.” He gasped. “Orders. We h- have orders to kill you.”

“I can’t leave without you.” She could feel the mists of nothing that clouded his mind and knew that she had to take advantage of this clarity before he slipped back into the void.

“Run.” He begged. “Please.”

She shook her head. “I’m not leaving you.” She called Bly’s helmet and rifle to her hand with the Force as she wrapped her other arm around him and pulled him to his feet, ignoring the strain on her own wound. They began to move across the landscape. She couldn’t sense any ill-will from him as he stumbled along beside her as he fought to keep the pace. The blaster burn through her side was screaming in agony, but she could ignore it if it meant that she could save Bly. Eventually, when he stumbled, she couldn’t pull him back up again.

“Aayla.” He reached a hand up to her face as she bent over him. “You need to leave me.”

"I won’t.” She glanced around at their surroundings. “There.” She pointed at a patch of thick brush. Having stowed Bly’s helmet and rifle amongst the brush, she was able to half drag half carry him to the shelter. Once they were both hidden from view, she allowed herself to collapse onto the ground, taking him with her. They lay in a heap for a few minutes, just breathing, until Bly rolled over onto his back and pulled her on top of him. She nuzzled her head into the crook of his neck and relaxed as she felt one of his hands begin to stroke one of her lekku. His other hand went down to the small of her back and rubbed slow circles onto her bare blue skin.

“You should have killed me.” Aayla could feel the rumble of his chest through his armor as he spoke.

“I couldn’t.” Now that she had stopped moving, the rush of adrenaline and fear that had been moving through her system was beginning to fade and she realized the true extent of her wound as breathing became painful. “Do you have a medpack on you?” She dared to ask.

“No. Already used it on a shiny that got tangled up in a nest of poison-spitters. I’m so sorry, Aayla. I-.”

“It wasn’t you.” She reached one hand up to the top of his head and stroked her fingers through his short hair. “I could sense it wasn’t you.” She gently reached out with the Force into his mind, a light touch whose presence she made known. When he relaxed under her she prodded deeper into his thoughts and allowed him to feel her own. When events had been settled, she withdrew from his mind and rested her hand in his hair. “I forgive you, Bly. I understand.”

“Aayla, you know that I love you.”

“I do. And I love you, Bly.” She closed her eyes and buried her face deeper into his neck. “I’m going to sleep now, and I want you to be there when I wake up.”

“I will be, I promise.” She felt Bly move his hand off her lekku down to join the other on her back, resting them gently against her skin. She felt safe, warm, the pain in her side was beginning to fade away. As she fell asleep for the last time, she knew that she was loved.

When Lieutenant Galle found them hours later, Bly was still holding Aayla in his arms. Galle knelt down in the brush beside them to watch the slow rise and fall of Bly’s chest. He dared not wake him. The drying tear tracks on Bly’s cheeks spoke of the pain that would be felt when he reawoke. So for now, Galle let him sleep.


	7. No 6. PLEASE….

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Obi-Wan and Cody lead a mission to scout out what appears to be an abandoned Separatist base.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Get it Out” | “Stop, please”  
> TW: Blood, Mentions of Death
> 
> Requested by @kitcatkim on Tumblr. Went hard on this one, hope I lived up to the expectation!

“Ready, Commander?”

Cody raised his head from his datapad to meet Obi-Wan’s gaze. “If you finally are.”

“And what does that mean?”

Cody refused to take Obi-Wan’s outstretched hand when he stood up. “We’ve all been waiting for quite some time for your arrival.”

A shout came from the waiting gunship. “It’s been a very long two minutes, General.”

“I see, then let’s not dally any longer or I’ll be caught up in whatever mess Anakin’s gotten himself into again.”

Cody gave his helmet a spin in his hands before setting it on his head. “Very good.”

As the two men turned towards the gunship, Obi-Wan pressed his hand against Cody’s back. He let it longer for a moment too long- just long enough for Cody to know, but not long enough that the men would suspect anything- before he drew back. “Any new developments in the time I’ve been gone?” He asked once they had boarded the gunship.

Cody waited until the doors closed before he responded. “None that I’ve heard. Still looks abandoned. But I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”

Obi-Wan turned to the sergeant beside him. “Any bets today?”

“Currently, we’re tied on whether we’ll be shot down or not. You’re the tiebreaker.”

“Has Cody voted?”

Cody slowly turned his head to the side to fix Obi-Wan with the blank stare of his helmet. “I don’t like to invite catastrophe, unlike _some_ men.”

Obi-Wan smirked and turned back to the sergeant. “Very well. I’ll vote that we’ll be shot down. It’s been too quiet around here.”

“Hear hear, sir!”

Obi-Wan looked back to Cody, who had turned forward to stare at the approaching planet through the slits in the gunship walls. “Is that satisfactory for you?”

“Let’s just say I hope that I don’t have to say ‘I told you so’ anytime soon.” Cody gently elbowed Obi-Wan, poking the point of his armor into Obi-Wan’s side.

“How painful that would be.” Obi-Wan let go of the gunship handle to bring up the holomap of what had been mapped out of the planet’s surface below. All helmets turned towards him as he began a quick briefing on what to expect on the surface. He stopped midsentence when the gunship shuddered and the lights went out.

“Obi-Wan?” The last thing Obi-Wan saw before he was thrown across the ship was Cody looking to him for answers.

When he came to again, Obi-Wan found himself in the rear of the gunship, legs tangled in the walker they had brought with them. He groaned as he became aware of an ache in his torso, he must’ve slammed into the walker before his legs did. When he untangled his legs and rose onto his hands and knees with a groan he realized that he was kneeling on the gunship wall. He raised his head to see sunlight filtering in from where there had once been a door. He followed the path of the light to a pile of yellow and white armor. Using the walker, he pushed himself to his feet, ignoring the strain it put on his bruised torso, and stumbled over to the center of the ship. His eyes scanned over the dead bodies of his men, searching for the one that he didn’t want to see. When they locked on a familiar helmet, barely visible to him behind what remained of the door, Obi-Wan fought through the tangle of bodies and plastoid to fall to his knees beside Cody. He reached out to his commander and was surprised to feel life still moving through him in the Force. Obi-Wan fought down a sob and gently removed Cody’s helmet, taking joy in watching the way his hair fell from the helmet to his forehead in loose curls.

Obi-Wan took hold of the gunship door in the Force. He had just begun to lift it when a cry and a pained voice interrupted him.

“Stop, please, stop.”

Obi-Wan stopped, not moving the door further away but also not daring to let it fall back down. “Cody. It’s me.” Keeping his focus in the Force, he reached a hand down to cup Cody’s jaw and turn his face towards him. All thoughts of the gunship door left his head when his hand came back bloody and he noticed the small trickle of blood that was making its way down Cody’s cheek. His focus was brought back to the situation at hand when Cody groaned as the door sunk back into his chest. Obi-Wan lowered his hand to Cody’s chest, resting it right above the bloodying wound. “Cody.”

Cody’s eyelids fluttered open at the sound of his name and a tired smile graced his lips at the man before him. “ _Cyar’e_.” He mumbled.

Obi-Wan took his other hand and gently wiped away the blood from Cody’s lips. “I’ve got you, you’re safe.”

“I told you so.” Cody muttered against Obi-Wan’s thumb, the slight exhale of speech pushing more blood down his lips.

“Yes, you did.” Obi-Wan felt a tear slide down his cheek. “I shouldn’t have joined the bet.”

Cody parted his lips to respond, but his attempt at speech ended in a bloody cough that sprayed blood droplets onto Obi-Wan’s robes.

Obi-Wan reached his arm behind Cody’s neck and leaned against the gunship floor that now served as the wall beside Cody. He pulled Cody’s head down onto his shoulder and leaned his own against him, careful not to tug his torso against the door. “I’ve got you, love.”

Cody didn’t respond and Obi-Wan felt another tear tracing its way down his cheek to join the first at the hollow, wet sound of Cody’s breath. He wanted to beg Cody to stay with him, plead with him to stay awake, to keep fighting. But he couldn’t. Attachment was forbidden for a Jedi, love less so, and he didn’t know if he could ever allow himself to feel the devotion that so many beings across the galaxy felt. Now, Obi-Wan understood why. If a Sith Lord were to show up at this moment and ask him to fall to the Dark Side to save Cody’s life, he would. He would forsake everything for him. But a Sith Lord was not here right now, so Obi-Wan pulled Cody tighter and closed his eyes, focusing on the life still in his love.

He didn’t hear the approaching gunship, didn’t hear the footsteps outside, didn’t hear the conversation growing closer until they were on him and he found himself being pulled away from Cody. Obi-Wan fought the arms for a moment before he gave in and watched Anakin cut away the wing of the ship from Cody’s body, allowing a team of medics to move him onto a stretcher. He found himself moving towards the stretcher, being pushed and pulled along by the captain who had pulled him back. On the gunship, he collapsed onto the ground in Rex’s arms and watched the medics flitting around the stretcher, clinging to the feeble spark of life coming from it.

* * *

Over the next two weeks, Obi-Wan led the 212th in a campaign against the Separatist forces that ended in their eventual defeat. When he returned to the Venator after negotiating the terms of surrender, he decided to shower before visiting Cody in the medbay. The last he had heard of him, he was in an induced coma as the medics strived to fight off infection.

To Obi-Wan’s surprise, he found Cody laying across his bed, datapad in hand and signing off on some forms. Cody looked up at his arrival, lips blossoming into a smile at Obi-Wan’s presence. “Hello, _cyar’e_.”

Obi-Wan crossed the room to the bed in two strides, leaning down to take Cody’s lips in his. He didn’t protest when Cody wrapped an arm around him and pulled him down to his side. Obi-Wan pulled back from the kiss when Cody flinched under his touch. “I’m sorry, are you okay?”

“Just don’t touch anything in the front.” Cody maneuvered Obi-Wan’s hand to a safe spot on the side of his hip and curled up beside him, resting his head against Obi-Wan’s chest.

“Cody, love, I need to shower.”

“Well, I need you here with me. Which one are you going to choose?”

Obi-Wan shook his head and kicked off his boots, letting them fall onto the ground beside his bed, before bringing his other hand up from under him to lay between Cody’s cheek and the pillow. He traced the bottom of Cody’s scar with his thumb, the familiar sensation returning the comfort that had been missing for the last two weeks. He ran his fingers over the scar tissue until Cody’s breaths deepened into a peaceful sleep. Only then did Obi-Wan close his eyes and follow him.


	8. No 7. I’VE GOT YOU

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Merrin goes to see Cal with thoughts of Dathomir on her mind. [Jedi: Fallen Order spoilers]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Support | Enemy to Caretaker  
> TW: Wounds
> 
> I’m still aware that I tagged this “All Media Types” and not just Clone Wars so let’s branch out shall we?
> 
> Spoilers for the ending of Fallen Order!

Cal leaned back against his bedside wall as he twirled a piece of the now destroyed holocron between his fingers. The weight of his decision sat heavy on his shoulders, but something still told him that it had been the right thing to do. If his thoughts weren’t on the holocron, they were on Trilla and the dark shadow who had struck her down. The head of the Inquisitorius. Darth Vader. It hadn’t been the first time Cal had felt the Dark Side, every Jedi had, but he had never known that it could emanate so strongly from one being. He squeezed his face up in pain as his other hand found the healing lightsaber wound in his side. Impaled upon his own blade. What would Master Tapal say?

His mental foray into the past ending with a polite knock on his door.

“Come in.” He called out, setting aside the holocron shard.

Merrin stepped into the room, hesitant as the door slid shut behind her. “I could sense your pain. It is annoying. So I brought you some painkillers.”

Cal held out his hand for her to pour them into his open palm. Merrin had not been on his mind, though perhaps she should have been. She had ultimately been the one to pull him and Cere from the water. The last thing Cal remembered before his world had gone dark had been the sight of her face and the swirl of green Dathomiri magick at her fingertips. Cal looked around for a drink, and turned back to see a cup of water in Merrin’s palm and the fading wisps of ichor. “Is that safe to drink?”

“I don’t see why not.” Merrin raised the cup to her lips, then passed it to Cal.

He took a hesitant sip, then a deeper one. “Tastes like normal water.”

“That’s because it is, silly.” Merrin sat down beside him on the bed and Cal decided that it would be best to finish the entire cup of water. To wash down the painkiller pill, of course. When he had finished drinking, the cup fell apart into green ichor that smoked down to the floor.

“Thank you, Merrin.”

“Can I look at your wound?”

“What?”

“Greez wouldn’t let me near you after I saved your life. I want to look at it.”

“I- sure.”

“Then take off your shirt.”

Cal blinked a few times as he processed what she was saying. “Of course.” He stammered, looking away from her as he undid the zipper of his jumpsuit. When he flinched reaching up to push the material off his shoulders, Merrin stepped in and slid the fabric down to his elbows, where he was able to finish the task. He flinched again when he felt a cold finger press against his back beside the wound.

“Hold still, let me look.”

He shivered as she ran her fingers around the perimeter of the wound, just close enough for his to sense her touch on the charred skin but not close enough to cause further pain.

"I have never seen a lightsaber wound on a living being before. I didn’t realize that they could heal.”

Cal looked back over to his shoulder, twisting around when he saw the far-away look in Merrin’s eyes. “Are you okay?” He set a hand on her leg. The gesture brought her focus back to the present and she looked to him, sadness in her gaze.

“I will be.” She answered, turning away and brushing back her loose lock of hair. “I have been alone for so long, with Malicos and the Nightbrothers, but still alone.”

“I know what you mean.” Cal followed her gaze across the room. “On Bracca, I had friends, I had Prauf, but nobody knew who I really was. They never knew me. But we’re not alone anymore.” He reached over to take her hand in his. “And we’ll heal.”

“You sound so certain.” She scoffed softly.

“Well, we’ve come this far. We can make it a little farther.” In the corner of his eye, Cal saw Merrin turn back to face him.

“Can I stay with you?”

“Sure.”

Cal was surprised when Merrin suddenly lunged over and wrapped her arms around him, careful this time not to brush against his wound. He froze for a moment, then wrapped his arms around her in return, pressing his jaw into her shoulder. Merrin had been right about the Jedi and the Nightsisters. They did not travel together, nor befriend one another. But survivors, survivors did. And maybe if survivors travelled together and befriended one another, they could also heal together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little shorter than usual. Now that I have exams coming up some of these are going to get shorter than they were before.


	9. No 8. WHERE DID EVERYBODY GO?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rex returns to the wreckage of the Venator once Ahsoka falls asleep to mourn his brothers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Abandoned | Isolation  
> TW: Death, Depression, Graphic Descriptions of Violence

The phrase ‘silent as the grave’ is misleading. Not all graves are silent. Some are, the ones that gave rise to the term certainly were. But not this one. It wasn’t the crackling of the small fire that burned at his side that broke the silence, nor the breathing of Ahsoka on the other side of that fire. It was the sound of the Venator breaking into pieces against the moon. Creaking metal screamed with every gust of wind, often breaking off and falling to the ground with a clatter. But to Rex, still awake, it was the screaming of his brothers and the clatter of their bodies as the ship broke the surface of the moon. So many of his brothers dead, joining those he had lost before. Hez, Vere, Ayar, Lunn, Ged, Vaize, Ince, Denal, Oz, Ringo, Hardcase, Dogma, Tup, Fives, Kix, _Vaughn, Sterling, Ridge, Jesse_. From Torrent Company down to the 332nd Company. And more, brothers whose names he could no longer remember. Or maybe he did remember but chose not to. He’d killed four of them himself. The group who had held the door of the medical bay in which Ahsoka had desperately tried to save him. Rex had shot blindly, but he knew that he hadn’t missed. Maybe, in the end, he’d saved them from a far more painful death. By the time he and Ahsoka had been able to climb into the wreckage, everyone had died, but there had been signs that they hadn’t all died immediately upon impact.

Rex pushed himself up into a standing position and stepped out from their sheltered alcove under a stable portion of wreckage. The stars of the galaxy shone above them. A galaxy that was now different, how different Rex had yet to learn, but different nonetheless. The Jedi were gone, and for all that humanity mattered, so were the clones. Even with the chip gone, Rex could feel it, the sheer numbing nothingness that had consumed him. He’d tried to fight it, and Fives had almost pulled him out, but when he had slipped and fallen it had bit into him and the venom it had left behind still ran through his blood. He could still feel the fall into the abyss. He should’ve trusted Fives, protected him, somehow changed the outcome of that day. But Fives had picked up his blaster and Fives had died, and that would not be changed. And that was why Rex was here, because of Fives. The millions of lives he could have saved had become one, and that one didn’t want his life when it came at the cost of all the others.

He found himself wandering to their graveyard. It wasn’t done yet, there were still bodies to pull from the wreckage, and still bodies to bury. Rex sunk to his knees beside one of them and knelt over it, pressing his forehead against the cracked plastoid.

It wasn’t supposed to end like this.

Rex found himself wishing, and not for the first time, that the man beneath him had executed him in the hangar. When he slept, he dreamt of a different scenario. One where Ahsoka escaped in the shuttle before Maul could get to it and Rex had died at Jesse’s hands. A single shot. Just the one, and he wouldn’t have found himself here. He should have died with him. He should’ve died with them. Clones weren’t meant to live alone, let alone live.

Rex’s tears wettened the dried blood staining Jesse’s armor, starting red rivulets that traced across the white plastoid.

Sometimes in war, it’s hard to be the one that survives.

Cody.

Was he dead too? Had General Kenobi cut him down when he turned his gun to him? Or had Cody killed his General? Rex didn’t know which scenario he preferred at the moment. Perhaps, the scenario that never happened, when Cody died at Yerbana, still himself and not knowing of the betrayal that was to come. That was the fate Rex wished he could choose for his friend. And Echo. Did he still have an inhibitor chip, or had that been removed when he had been stripped of his humanity? Cody was right. It was hard to be the one that survives.

Rex’s grip across Jesse’s torso tightened as a sob wracked his body. He couldn’t break down in front of Ahsoka. Break? Yes. But breaking and falling to pieces are two separate motions, and he had to stay strong for her during the day. He was all she had left in the galaxy. Obi-Wan and Anakin were dead, half of the men she had served with were dead, the other half wanted to kill her, and the Jedi were gone. Rex couldn’t help but feel that their blood was on his hands. If he’d listened to Fives, if he’d really listened and deescalated the situation beforehand, they would all still be here. The Jedi, his men, Fives and Jesse, would be here. Rex was already broken, but he let himself fall to pieces amongst his brothers. In the morning, he would put himself back together for Ahsoka, but tonight, he would sleep among his brothers for the last time.

As Rex lay down in the dirt beside Jesse, he didn’t notice the slight figure watching him from the far edge of the wreckage behind him.

* * *

Ahsoka was still asleep when he returned to their camp. The rosy pastels of dawn were just beginning to streak across the sky, but the sun hadn’t risen yet to awake her. As Rex lowered himself back to the ground beside the fire she stirred, eyes blinking open to meet his when she sat up.

“Where’d you go?”

Rex fumbled for his canned response. “Had to take a leak.”

Ahsoka nodded, seeming disappointed by his response. “Will you hold me?”

“Yeah, I can hold you.”

Ahsoka stood up and made her way around to his side of the fire, lowering herself into his lap and wrapping her arms around his neck, pulling him close to her. Rex wondered if she could sense his own emotions and buried his face into her lekku as he hid the pain of the night deeper within his soul. She didn’t need to know that he felt emptier with her than he had among the empty bodies of his brothers, where he had left his soul.


	10. No 9. FOR THE GREATER GOOD

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When their ship comes under attack, Rex and Ahsoka desperately try to hold off the droids from the control room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Take Me Instead” | “Run!”   
> TW: Character Death

“How’s that backup, Rex?” Ahsoka called over her shoulder as she danced amongst the battle droids. She found herself thanking the Force that she’d chosen to wield two blades, not for the first time, but certainly not the last.

“They’re rather preoccupied with our friends in the hanger at the moment. I think it’s just us, kid.” Rex crouched in the hollows of the walls on her left, occasionally rising up with a droid popper or to shoot past her into the seemingly endless mass of droids before them. “We’ve gotta hold on until they can clear a path to us.”

“Sithspit!” Ahsoka let out a string of swears that would’ve gotten her a Temple assignment had Anakin been there. But Anakin wasn’t there, he was in the hanger with the rest of the droid forces, and Rex would never sell her out to her master. She’d learned to swear from him after all. Rex didn’t tell Anakin what she’d said, Ahsoka didn’t tell Anakin where she had learned it.

She began to fall back so that her feet could move without fear of slipping on some fallen droid until she was nearly even with Rex. She couldn’t imagine the carnage that may have occurred if she and Rex hadn’t stayed on the bridge after the first attack. They hadn’t anticipated a second wave. There would’ve been no one to defend the bridge. And yet, there still could be no one to defend the bridge if they fell.

She fell back again when the ground had become littered with droid parts once more. This time, Rex moved with her, back towards the door to the bridge.

She was growing tired. They had been here for too long, and they were now losing ground to the droid army. They needed a new strategy. As she was analyzing the mass of droids ahead of her, though a mass now growing smaller, she missed a fallen droid aiming its blaster towards her. The blast went through her forearm, forcing her to drop her green blade. As she stumbled, she saw Rex rise from behind the outcrop of the wall to come forward and cover her.

“Ahsoka, run!” He stepped between her and the battle droids and she turned to run towards the bridge door. When she reached the door, she found it to be sealed. She raised her arm for her comm and found that it had been destroyed by the blaster fire. She ran back towards Rex, ducking into the hollow wall behind where he stood.

“It’s no use, the door’s jammed and my comm’s dead.” She yelled over the sounds of blaster fire.

Rex made a sound as if he was going to respond, but it was cut off with a cry as a blaster bolt finally made contact. He retreated back towards Ahsoka, firing until his magazines ran out.

“Rex?” She whimpered as he fell to his knees before her, reaching a hand towards the burn across his chest.

Wordlessly, he wrapped an arm around her and pulled her against his chest until one of her lekku squished against his armor. With her lekku against him, she could hear the wet sucking sound at the end of every inhale and exhale and she lay a hand over the blaster burn as if she could heal his ruined chest. He pressed her into the corner of the hollow so that she was fully shielded by his body and leaned his helmet down into the gap between her montrals.

Though she couldn’t see anything, Ahsoka could hear the droids advancing on their position. And then they were upon them, marching past them to the bridge.

Ahsoka let out a muffled cry when Rex’s breathing faltered as some of the passing droids shot him in the back. Pressed against him, she could hear the flesh and muscle burning with each shot and the pained stutter of his breath. She thought that they must surely come for her as well, but none did, and she realized that they must’ve thought their shots had hit her too. The blasterfire stopped when Rex’s body finally went limp over her and the droids continued their march on the bridge.

When the squad had passed them, their assault on the bridge a success, Ahsoka reached up to remove Rex’s helmet before she reached her arms around his waist and turned him over as she lowered him into her lap, propping up his head and shoulders on her thighs. His eyes fluttered open as she ran a hand over his forehead before he shook in a weak coughing fit.

“Hang in there, Rex.” She said as she reached down to take one of his hands, giving it a reassuring squeeze. She felt guilty just for voicing her request. Even with Rex laying across her lap she could still hear the sucking of a punctured lung as he gasped for air.

“It’s okay, ‘Soka.” He squeezed her hand as he caught his breath. “It’s been an- an honor t- to…” His expression froze, and his hand went limp in hers.

“Rex? No. No, Rex!” She shook his body, fighting down a cry when she received no response. The droids were still out there, they would come back and kill her if they heard her scream. They may come back and kill her anyways, she could hear their approaching footsteps.

To her shock, it was Anakin and the clones charging past her to retake the bridge. One clone faltered to a stop before her before stepping into the hollow and kneeling beside Rex. Kix took his helmet off and set it beside Rex’s before reaching over to feel for a pulse. Ahsoka kept her gaze locked on his hand, finally turning away when he moved to close Rex’s eyes.

“He died because of me, if I’d destroyed that droid in the first place-.”

Kix’s hand on her shoulder stopped her outburst. “Don’t think like that. You gave it your best, but sometimes, our best just isn’t good enough.” He looked down to her forearm where the blasterfire had struck, then looked back to her face. “I’m going to take Rex so that you can get yourself to the medbay, okay?”

Ahsoka nodded, letting tears stream down her cheeks for the first time. “Will you walk with me?”

“Of course.” Kix reached for Rex’s helmet and set it back over his head before he took the body from Ahsoka, pulling him snugly against his chest. Ahsoka stood up after him.

“Ahsoka!” She turned to see Anakin running up to them, faltering at the sight of Rex in Kix’s arms. Ahsoka let out a cry as she flung herself into her master’s arms, feeling Anakin’s hand go immediately to her back headtail as he pulled her tight against him. “I’ve got you, Ahsoka. I’ve got you.” He murmured as she sobbed into his robes.

It was only after she had cried herself out when he scooped her up into his arms and followed Kix to the medbay.


	11. No 10. THEY LOOK SO PRETTY WHEN THEY BLEED

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Commander Fox leads an assault on a team of bounty hunters who have infiltrated the Senate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blood Loss | Trail of Blood  
> TW: Blood, Graphic Descriptions, Character Death
> 
> Long day, late post.
> 
> I know I already used the bounty hunters trope but this idea came first so I’m keeping it this way.

Fox lay on the floor of the Senate Auditorium clutching his arms across his bloodying stomach amongst the remains of his squad. He could hear someone coughing behind him but didn’t have the strength or willpower to turn onto his back to identify them. He should’ve seen the knife. A rarity, but still a possibility he should have been prepared for. He’d seen the other bounty hunter’s blaster, shot it out of his hands too, then he’d dodged the punch. But he hadn’t seen the knife. It had only taken one slash to fell him. One hot line of pain ripping through him and he was useless. He’d cried out too, the first time his hands had made contact with the wound and he felt his guts rippling beneath his touch. He’d rather have taken the blaster shot. It would’ve been less painful.

He heard another bounty hunter fall and then Bravo, the last standing member of their squad, clutching a single wound to the gut from the same blade that had felled Fox.

“Do we kill them now, boss?”

Fox could feel his intestines pressing against his hands with every breath as he waited for a final shot to the head or the press of the knife against his throat.

“No, just leave th-.” The bounty hunter’s sentence was cut off by the sound of blaster fire and Fox heard the bodies hit the floor behind him. Maybe Thire was right, they should’ve waited for Stone.

Fox closed his eyes. The pain was beginning to dull. Some part of him was aware that it was due to the ever-increasing puddle of blood staining the carpet around him, but the other part of him was growing tired and he let one hand fall to the floor. He hoped that the Senate Guard would escort the senators out one of the side entrances so that Riyo wouldn’t have to see his body. He had a feeling that they wouldn’t and knew that he should bring his hand back across the wound, but he couldn’t find the strength to lift it once more. Then the pain was back, and Fox yelped and his eyes shot open as a new pair of hands turned him onto his back and grabbed at his stomach, trying to hold the torn skin together. He kicked out of instinct, the motion only bringing more pain.

“Easy, Commander.” The guardsman said, pinning down Fox’s legs with one of his own. He could feel another guardsman’s hands pressing down on his heaving shoulders, trying to minimize his movement. Once he had stilled once more, the man left, leaving Fox and the first guardsman alone.

The lights above were becoming too bright. Fox turned his head back to the side, towards Bravo. Stone knelt over him now. He had removed their helmets and pulled the man into his lap. Fox nearly protested the breach of protocol before he noticed how pale Bravo was and realized that he wouldn’t have made it anyway.

“How big a bill you think?” Fox murmured.

“I don’t understand, sir.”

“How much to clean us out of the carpet?”

The guardsman scoffed. “I don’t know. It’s coming out of your paycheck, sir.”

Fox attempted a weak laugh, which faded into a moan as his torn abdominal muscles tried to flex.

“Just hang in there, Commander, so we can discuss the bill later.”

Fox knew that the guardsman was just trying to hold his attention, but he couldn’t focus on him. His gaze was still fixed on Stone and Bravo. He watched as Stone pressed his forehead against Bravo’s before replacing his helmet and laying his still body back on the ground. Fox closed his eyes, hoping that the other fallen members of his squad had fared better than they had.

* * *

Riyo’s gaze scanned the auditorium as the mass of senators entered, escorted by members of the Coruscant and Senate guards. Many of the senators were ready to get back to their offices, but Riyo was looking for the man whose office she had been in prior to the attacks. This had been the last reported location of the bounty hunters. He would have to be here. Her stride faltered as she noticed the white sheets on the righthand side of the door she had just entered through. Beside one of the sheets, a puddle of blood soaked into the carpet. Riyo followed what looked like drag marks with her eyes to find a barely-there trail of blood stains. She stepped away from the pack of senators so that she could fully see the trail, following it to the red glove hanging off the side of a stretcher en route to the medical transport waiting outside the doors of the auditorium. It took her a moment to realize that the glove had always been red, even before it had dripped with blood.

She gasped and pushed past her fellow senators as she ran to catch up to the stretcher. When she came alongside them, she took Fox’s hand in hers. She received no response as she took in the sight before her, gagging on the thick smell of his blood. Her eyes found the bloody gash across his stomach and her footsteps nearly halted in shock when she realized that she could see his guts through the blood when he breathed in, the only thing keeping them inside being the medical droid hovering above him holding the skin together. She let out a quiet cry of relief when she felt Fox’s hand squeeze hers three times before his grip slackened once again.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but you need to step away.” A medic was telling her. Riyo realized that they’d reached the medical transport and finally allowed her footsteps to falter, stopping short of the transport and letting Fox’s hand fall from her grasp. But she stood by and watched as they loaded Fox’s body in and continued to stand there when they pulled away.

* * *

Fox awoke to the light touch of small fingers on his hand. He slowly opened his eyes, blinking as he adjusted to the harsh overhead lights, to see Riyo sitting beside the bed, lazily tracing the lines of his palm. He watched her, trying not to move in any way that would tell her that he’d woken up. She was wearing the same clothes that he’d seen her in that morning, but she had pulled her hair down from its updo so that it hung in purple curls that framed her face. Her gaze never wandered from his hand. He glanced down to follow her gaze and noticed that her hands were stained with blood.

“It was you.” He said. Somewhere between the ground and the hospital bed he had gained consciousness to a pair of hands clasped around his. He hadn’t had the strength to open his eyes or even move his head to confirm his suspicion, but he had given them three quick squeezes anyway. Their silent ‘I love you’.

“Yeah, it was me.” She reached over and pushed his hair back from his forehead, letting her hand fall down to cup his cheek.

“Stay?”

She nodded and lay her head down on his hand. “Always.”


	12. No 11. PSYCH 101

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Chancellor learns of Commander Fox and Riyo’s relationship and orders his property to be destroyed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Defiance | Struggling | Crying  
> TW: Character Death

Afternoon sunlight streamed down onto Fox’s armor, laying on the ground beside one of the entertaining couches in Riyo’s office. Fox himself lay across the couch, clothed in only his blacks from the waist up. His head and shoulders were propped up on a pillow and Riyo was leaning over him, propping herself up by the elbows on the same pillow so that she could lean down to kiss him.

There was a knock on the door and Riyo pulled back from the kiss to glance towards it.

“You’re not expecting anyone right?” Fox asked.

“No. Besides, it’s locked.” She paused to think. “If they come by tomorrow or call, I’ll just tell them I went home early.” She leaned back down to kiss him again and he wrapped his arms around her waist and the back of her head, pulling her closer to him to make up for the absence.

There was the sound of the door opening, and Riyo jerked back up as the Senate Guard entered,  led by their captain.

“Commander Fox, you are under arrest for infidelity to the Republic and failing to uphold your oath of office. ” The captain stood back as his man advanced, taking hold of the two beings.

Riyo cried out as she was grabbed by the bicep and pulled away from Fox. “You have no authority to break in here and arrest this man! Who  authorized this?”

The captain stared blanky at her as his men pulled Fox from the couch, forcing him to his knees with stun batons so that they could cuff him. “CC-1010, you are hereby to be stripped of your title and position and to be decommissioned by the order of the Chancellor.”

Riyo screamed every insult she could think of at the man as she kicked at the guards holding her, stilling at the sound of Fox’s voice. “Ri, Riyo, it’s okay.” She turned to meet his steady gaze. “It was worth it. I love you.” At that, the guards holding him down yanked him to his feet and began to drag him towards the door. “I love you!” He shouted back to her before receiving a strike across the face from the blue guard.

When he was gone, the hold on her arms loosened and she fell to the floor with a sob.

* * *

Fox stared blankly ahead at the city lights that surrounded him. On any other occasion, he would’ve relished the feeling of the night breeze in his hair, but tonight, the knowledge of where the speeder was heading took that enjoyment away from him. His predicament hadn’t seemed real until now. The debriefing was as formal as any, if more honest, and even when he was laying on the bench in his  cell he hadn’t been able to process the events of the past few hours. It was only when Stone entered the cell with cuffs in his hands and a look of defeat on his face that Fox had comes to terms with his own mortality. The events following that had been a blur. Stone’s embrace, the promise he’d made, the line of men who had awaited Fox, lining up from his cell to the prison entrance in a salute, the waiting speeder.

Fox could see the Republic Health Center now, its distinct architecture looming behind the mass of skyscrapers that surrounded it. How many times had his life been saved  here? Maybe it was fitting that it would end here. Rys and Jek squeezed his hands when the speeder turned to approach the spire.

Rys spoke first. “We’ll look out for her, Fox.”

“Anything she needs, we’ll be there.” Jek promised.

“Thank you.” Fox murmured, squeezing their hands in return. He didn’t know what else to say, what else he could say, and they remained silent as the speeder landed. Only he stepped out, an armed medical droid would escort him around the facility. When he turned back to say a final goodbye to Jek and Rys the speeder was already gone. Perhaps it was better that way. He followed the medical droid into the facility and through a maze of identical doors in a pristine hallway. It reminded him of Kamino, and not in a good way. When the medical droid turned and entered one of the doorways, Fox followed.

Thire was upon him the moment he stepped into the room and Fox melted into his arms as he had Stone’s. “I’ll take care of her, Fox. No being will harm her as long as I’m alive, I swear.” Thire whispered.

“Thank you,  Thire .” Fox muttered. 

“It’s been an honor to serve with you, Fox.” At that,  Thire stepped back, revealing a sparse room with a single bed and Riyo, who was standing in the corner and looked like she was trying to not collapse. Fox took another step into the room, looking between Riyo and the waiting medical droid. 

Riyo came to a decision before he did. She ran across the room and flung herself into his arms, suppressing a sob into his chest. “It’s okay, it’s okay.” He murmured as he held her. “It was worth it. Everything was worth it, I love you, Riyo.”

Riyo pulled back from his chest, keeping her arms wrapped around him as she looked up into his gaze. “And I love you, Fox.”

Fox brought his hands to her face, stroking his thumbs across the pastel green arcs on her cheeks, wiping away her tears.

“CC-1010, it is time for me to administer the serum. Please, take a seat on the provided table.” The droid interrupted. Fox couldn’t find the will to be mad at it. He pressed a last kiss to Riyo’s lips and walked over to the table.

“You don’t need to restrain me.” Fox growled once he had sat down as the medical droid reached down for the restraints. The medical droid paused, then with a nod from Thire left them alone.

Riyo approached the bed and stood beside him, taking his hand in hers. Fox squeezed it as his head was pushed to the side, exposing his neck to the medical droid. He felt the prick of the needle as it dug into his skin and the prick of Riyo’s fingernails digging into his hand. The serum was cold. He could feel it  entering his veins and the initial spread through his bloodstream before the temperatures equalized. Then the needle was gone, and the medical droid was stepping out of the door.

A deep exhaustion was setting into his body. His eyes began to close against his will as his muscles relaxed. He tried to fight it, taking in a deep shuddering breath, but the concern that rose in Riyo’s golden eyes stopped him from taking another like it. For her, he could die without a fight.

She leaned over him, taking his face in the hand not holding his and stroking her fingers across his cheekbones. He managed a weak smile, forcing the muscles in his face to move against the exhaustion setting in. “I’m okay.” He murmured. “It doesn’t hurt. Ri, I-.” His lips moved to form the rest of the sentence; his shallow breaths unable to force sound past his lips.

“I love you too, Fox.” She smiled sadly. Her face was becoming blurry as his vision began to fade. He closed his eyes, focusing on the feeling of her hands, her scent, her voice. Anything he could hold on to. “I’ll stay with you until the end. I love...” She continued to talk to him, but he found he couldn’t distinguish one word from the next.

The world was fading, closing in on him until it encompassed just  her and the light rise and fall of his chest. Then that stopped, and it was just her. Her touch was fading too, but he could still hear the murmuring of her voice. Only then, at the very end, did he allow his hand to fall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Had this rattling around in my head for a while now. I know I’ve done the same characters twice back to back now so we’re gonna get back to shaking things up tomorrow. For the non-Foxiyo shippers, this is the last idea I had for them so you're in the clear. For the Foxiyo shippers, I'll stop with the pain now.
> 
> Also, a reminder that I’m doing these things in order, so if there’s an upcoming prompt that you’d like to make a request for hit me up here in the comments or on Tumblr at redrobinhoood. Or literally just asking for characters or a ship you’d like to see. Choosing the characters is half the battle here.


	13. No 12. I THINK I’VE BROKEN SOMETHING

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Ghost receives a transmission concerning a former Jedi, a farm boy, and the Death Star.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Broken Down | Broken Trust  
> TW: None
> 
> A continuation of the first story from this series, Let's Hang Out Sometime.

“Skywalker?”

“Kenobi?”

“Do these names mean something to you?” Hera looked up from the briefing that had just been transmitted to the _Ghost_ crew.

“Skywalker was the name of my general in the Clone War, the same for Cody and General Kenobi.”

Cody shook his head, raising a hand to rub the scar that had been left behind by the removal of his chip. “But he’s dead. I watched him fall.”

“Does the name ‘Ben’ mean anything to you, Cody?” Hera pried.

“It was always his name when he went undercover. It must be a family member. He had a family before the Order. It can’t be the same Kenobi.”

“It sounds to me like this man is a Jedi.” Hera paused, looking around at the crew around her. “You’ve heard us talk about Ezra. He went looking for Obi-Wan Kenobi once, two years ago. He didn’t say anything about him when he returned, but Maul was killed, and I don’t think it was Ezra.”

Cody lowered his head, barely acknowledging the hand Rex lay on his shoulder. “It can’t be. His varactyl was destroyed, I saw the chunks in the sinkhole. It was completely shredded. There is no way he could have survived that blast, we meant to kill him!”

“What if,” Rex spoke softly, “we go back to Yavin and check it out. We can speculate all day on how good you are at killing Jedi, but the easiest way to end this argument is to meet this Ben Kenobi and Luke Skywalker.”

Hera nodded. “Cody?”

Cody sighed. “Okay.”

"You can say ‘no’, you know.” Kallus interrupted. “You don’t have to do what she says here. No one’s going to beat you.”

Cody didn’t see the looks of horror passed around the _Ghost_ crew. He scoffed, looking back up at Kallus. “The beatings never worked anyways. Besides, we need to go back to Yavin to offload the blueprints Chopper’s got.”

Hera stood up. “Then I’ll set our course for Yavin. We should get there around the same time as this _Millennium Falcon_ does.”

* * *

“Is that Boba Fett?”

“What, with the _Ghost_? No.”

“Well, he looks a lot like Boba Fett.”

“Han-.” Leia protested.

Obi-Wan interrupted them. “He’s a clone.”

“Then why does a clone look like Boba Fett?”

Obi-Wan chuckled and stepped off the ramp of the _Millennium Falcon_. He heard Luke thundering down the stairs behind him with the grace of a farm boy.

“Who is Boba Fett?”

“A bounty hunter, and not our concern at the moment.” Obi-Wan chided, looking back towards the _Ghost_ , where the clone was still staring in his direction. Something about him felt familiar. A member of the 212th, perhaps. Obi-Wan found himself walking over to him.

“Where is he going?”

“Just hook R2 up and start the download, I’ll follow Ben.”

The clone had turned back around to face his companions when he’d caught Obi-Wan’s attention and now Obi-Wan took them in as well. A twi’lek, a lasat, and four humans. A Mandalorian, the clone, no, two clones. The older man beside the one who had caught Han’s attention was wearing the armor of the 501st. Then the younger clone turned completely back to Obi-Wan and he saw the scar. Obi-Wan stopped in his tracks at the sight of his former commander, their eyes locked together. They were only meters away from each other. Obi-Wan slowly walked over, aware that all eyes in the vicinity were on him. He stopped an arm’s length away from Cody and reached out to touch his shoulder.

Cody flinched the moment Obi-Wan’s hand raised and he stepped back, raising a hand to the side of his skull.

“Cody.” Obi-Wan faltered for what to say.

“I can still hear them.”

“Cody, let me help you.”

“No! No. I might hurt you.”

“Cody. Do you trust me?” Obi-Wan’s heart sank at the haunted look in Cody’s eyes as he realized that he did not.

“I can’t.” Cody turned from him and walked back into the _Ghost_.

The 501st clone started after him but was held back by one of the humans. “Rex, don’t.”

* * *

Cody managed to make it to his cabin before he fell apart. His knees buckled from under him and he crashed to the floor in the middle of the room. He pressed his head into the floor, trying to focus on anything but the void. He had been right. He could never escape. The chip was gone, but the hollow it had left behind hadn’t been filled. Its ghost still whispered that _good soldiers follow orders_. He still wanted to kill. He would kill, given the chance.

His rest was over. He would fall again.

“In the event of Jedi officers acting against the interests of the Republic, GAR commanders will remove those officers by lethal force at the order of the Supreme Commander. Clone protocol sixty-six.” The voice came from the doorway.

“It was meant to be a contingency. There were a hundred and fifty orders, all last resorts.” Cody felt a hand press against his back. He was still not used to contact without the press of armor between beings, but he refused to wear plastoid again. “We never thought that we’d use any of them.”

Obi-Wan sat down beside him, keeping his hand on Cody’s back. “You said you could still hear them.”

“Good soldiers follow orders.”

“In the event of Jedi officers acti-”

“I know the order.”

“-gainst the interests of the Republic, that’s how it begins. Alexsandr Kallus told me that you worked under Vader. Was he a Jedi officer?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“He was before the end of the war. But he is not anymore. I was also a Jedi officer during the war. If Vader isn’t a Jedi anymore, why am I?”

Cody let out a shaky breath as he felt an arm reach under him before he was pulled against Obi-Wan’s chest. He could feel the press of Obi-Wan’s lightsaber against his hip. Jedi carried lightsabers, but so did Vader, and Vader wasn’t a Jedi, and to be a Jedi officer one had to have a command, and Obi-Wan didn’t have a command. Cody tried to follow the train of logic to its conclusion.

“I’m so sorry.” Cody whispered into Obi-Wan’s cloak. No command, not an officer, not a Jedi.

“It was never you.” Obi-Wan stood up, pulling Cody with him. “We brought the plans to the Death Star with us. Revenge is not the Jedi way, but…”

Cody stepped back, meeting Obi-Wan’s eyes. “I want to see them burn.” Then he faltered as he remembered the boys that he had once trained. But this was a war. But they’d had no choice. “The officers, the ones in charge, them. Not the stormtroopers, we need to give them a chance to evacuate.”

“Nobody here is willing to say that, Cody.”

Cody nodded. “Then I will. If the Alliance kills them without a second thought, we’re no better than the Empire.”

Obi-Wan smiled at him. The years had aged him, but it was still the same smile that Cody had always known. “You’ve changed.”

Cody shrugged, stepping towards the door of his cabin. “I’m playing human.”

Obi-Wan followed, the same wry smile on his face. “It’s a good look on you. You’ll have to tell me why later.”

“I’ll tell you everything.” Cody promised.

They stepped off the _Ghost_ together, back amongst its crew and an awestruck blond boy who was engaged in a conversation with Rex. Something about him struck a familiar chord with Cody, but he couldn’t place it. He didn’t need to. Despite the pain, he knew these beings were his home and he would fight for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have so many thoughts on Cody, I need to make this a standalone story at some point before the Kenobi series like kills him or something.
> 
> (I know the ending is cheesy but it's that or an angsty 500 word mini essay justifying that one sentence and after all the character deaths we need a good ending.)


	14. No 13. BREATHE IN BREATHE OUT

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Captured during the infiltration of a Separatist base, Plo Koon chooses to save the lives of his men over his own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oxygen Mask  
> TW: None
> 
> College student with college exams, here’s a short chapter for yesterday. Short chapter for today coming later.

Commander Wolffe was dragged back to consciousness by two sets of rough hands on his shoulders as his men flipped him onto his back. He fought against them to push himself upright, relieved when he could open his eyes and see his knees before him. Then he closed them again as ragged coughs racked his body. 

“Easy, Commander.” The man on his left said, bringing a hand over to stroke Wolffe’s back through the fit. 

He was shaking and aware that spit was coating his chin and cheek, but he couldn’t find the strength to wipe it away. One of his men did instead, gently wiping it away with a bare section of his blacks. “Just breathe, sir. You fell right beside the grate, you took the worst...” Wolffe couldn’t follow the sentence anymore, his head was swimming and he didn’t see General Plo. He let his head fall towards the other man supporting him. 

“Where’s the general?” He asked. When he didn’t get an immediate answer he pushed himself to his feet, swaying slightly but refusing to fall. Another one of his men approached and slipped an arm around him, holding him upright. Sinker. Now that he didn’t have to focus on standing, Wolffe turned his attention around the room. Some men were standing or sitting, still catching their breath, others were trying to help those still on the floor, a few weren’t moving. All were helmetless. Finally, Wolffe’s eyes fell on his general. He stumbled over to him, half led half dragged by Sinker, and fell to the floor beside him. 

“Commander Wolffe.” Plo greeted with a heavy voice. His goggles had been allowed to stay, but his antiox mask was gone and nowhere to be seen. 

“What did you do?” 

“I exchanged the pure Dorin gas in the room for a mix of oxygen and other gasses that you could breathe.” 

“But you’ll die.” 

“Most likely.” 

Wolffe’s strength finally failed him and he fell to the floor beside his general, pressing a hand against Plo’s chest to focus himself. 

“The choice has been made, Wolffe. We can’t change it now.” Plo took Wolffe’s hand in his, giving him a reassuring squeeze. “I am at ease leaving our men in your hands. Never give in, son.” 

Wolffe squeezed his general’s hand as hard as he could. The burst of energy that had risen earlier was gone now, and all he could do was hold on and fight back the bursts of light swimming in his vision. The light overwhelmed him long before Plo’s grip on his hand had faded. 

* * *

When Wolffe opened his eyes once more it was to a familiar brother at his side. Fox gave his hand a reassuring squeeze, then reached over to pin Wolffe down as he tried to get up. 

“He’s fine, Wolffe. He’s fine. You’re on Coruscant.” Fox waited until the tension had left Wolffe’s body before drawing back. “All but three of your squad survived. Y- don’t you dare!” He grabbed Wolffe’s hand as he reached for the mask covering his face. 

“I want to see him. Fox’ika l-.” 

“Don’t you start that.” Fox growled. “He’ll be fine, he is fine, but you need to rest too or I’ll tell them that they need to drain your lungs again.” 

Wolffe glared at Fox and drew his hand back, laying it down back by his side. “What are you suggesting I do instead?” 

Fox sat back down on the stool that had been provided to the room. “Tell me about the war.” 

Wolffe looked over his brother suspiciously, waiting for the catch that never came. And so, he did. 


	15. No 14. IS SOMETHING BURNING?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thire finds that the Emperor has found a solution for telling the identical clones apart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Branding  
> TW: None

Thire looked around cautiously as he was led into the new room. Whatever this was, it’d better be important to have taken him away from his men and the Emperor. He stopped in his tracks when he saw the furnace and the metal tools on the far side of the room, taking in a sharp breath as he evaluated the situation. 

“Commander Thire, right?” The man standing by the furnace called over to him. “I’m sure you’re wondering what this is all about.” 

“Very much so.” Thire said as casually as he could muster. 

“Well, I am too, but I have orders from the Emperor, you see. No explanation, just orders. I’m sure you know how that is.” 

Thire paused, wondering how carefully he should choose his words. “I do.” 

“Then if you wouldn’t mind cuffing yourself,” the blacksmith gestured to a pair of cuffs coming down from the ceiling, “we can get started. Oh, but first, I’ll need you to take your blacks off. Don’t be shy, we’ve had enough clones come through here today.” 

Every sense he had, every bone and nerve and muscle in his body was screaming for him to run. But Thire was a good clone, or at least he was from the perspective of the Kaminoans and the Emperor he now served, so he slowly removed his blacks and made his way over to the center of the room. Before he could deliberate on whether or not to place his hands into the cuffs, the assistant who had led him into the room raised Thire’s arms and cuffed him. He tugged against them, an easy gesture considering that his wrists were now raised before his forehead. They didn’t budge. 

“Can you confirm his designation?” The blacksmith called out as he looked over the selected numbers across the brand. 

“Says he was designated CT-4477, but now he’s CC-4477.” The assistant called back. 

“Interesting. Tell me, son, how did you go from being a trooper to a commander?” 

Thire gave his wrists another tug. No use. “Guess I’m good at what I do.” 

“I suppose that’s one way to put it.” The brand sizzled as it was lowered into the fire. “Did you replace somebody or do they just promote y’all for fun somedays?” 

“I replaced a man named Commander Thorn. He died a few months before the Republic fell.” 

The blacksmith made a humming sound. “That’s unfortunate.” 

“Not anymore it’s not.” Thire glared at the wall before him. “Now I’m glad he’s dead. I just wish we’d all had the good sense to follow him.” 

The blacksmith was silent, then Thire heard the noise of the brand being withdrawn from the flames. 

“Bite down on this.” The assistant said, holding a leather strap to his mouth. It was wet, covered in the saliva of his brothers. Thire bit into it, keeping his glare levelled at the wall. He was determined not to scream. 

He cried out in agony the moment the brand touched his skin, pressing deep into the meat of his right shoulder. He could smell his own flesh burning as it was seared away under the press of hot metal. He bit down into the leather as his jaw clenched. When the brand pulled away he threw his head back as he fought for air through the groans of pain that managed to slip past his senses and the leather strap still in his mouth. He wished he hadn’t when he saw the blacksmith remove a curved brand from the furnace. He brought his head back up, pressing his forehead against his thumbs as he braced himself for the next mark. He felt a clamp slide into place over his left foot but didn’t have time to process why before a ring of hot fire burned into his calf. He screamed again like he had never screamed before, biting down so hard on the leather strap that he thought his jaw would break. 

When the brand was drawn away a second time his legs gave out from under him. The cuffs around his wrists caught his fall, eliciting a whimper as the skin of his branded shoulder tugged with the movement. 

“You’re a tough one, Commander Thire.” The blacksmith said as he opened the cuffs that held Thire’s wrists, catching the man when he inevitably fell. “Most of you clones pass out or lose control of yourselves, but not you. I think you’ve been our quietest one so far.” He pulled the leather strap from Thire’s mouth and set it on the ground. Thire allowed his head to loll against the other man’s chest, the pain signals from both sides of his body overwhelming all other senses. 

The assistant roughly shoved his blacks on again, taking no care to not disturb the setting wounds, before he dragged a stumbling Thire out of the room, out of the small foyer, and back to the speeder that had brought him. Thire had never been so grateful to see a droid before. When the droid and the speeder dropped him off at the barracks, Thire somehow found the strength to walk from the speeder bay to his bunk before his branded leg collapsed from under him and he fell against his bed. He managed to fling himself onto the mattress and lay still, occasionally whimpering as the pain reached a new height. 

He didn’t see any of the sympathetic looks his men cast him as they returned from their shifts, didn’t feel them press a hand into his back in comfort, didn’t notice their presence. Finally, one brother stopped beside him and began to undress him. Thire cried out quietly as his blacks were stripped away from the melted flesh, feeling every fiber dissociate from the burns. Once he had been stripped of his blacks again, he heard the light clatter of plastoid on the ground before Jek crawled into the bed with Thire. No words were exchanged as Jek lay down beside his brother, pulling his head to his chest. Thire closed his eyes, breathing in the scent of his brother’s blacks instead of his own burnt flesh. He knew that he would be doing the same thing for Jek in the future. 


	16. No 15. INTO THE UNKNOWN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ahsoka dreams about Barriss Offee and the tipping points in their friendship.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Possession | Alt 10. Nightmares  
> TW: Implied Character Death
> 
> Something slightly different for this one. I know I’m a day behind right now, but I’ll be catching up this weekend, if not this evening.

“Barriss!” Ahsoka cried out as her friend smashed through the glass panel, lunging towards her with her lightsaber drawn. She wanted to say more to her, tell her to fight off the brain worm’s control, but her tongue refused to move in her mouth. Instead, she ran.

_It had happened something like that. The glass had broken, they had touched blades, Ahsoka had run. But she had been able to speak._

She ran to the bridge, shivering as a cold wave of air swept through the ship.

_Something like that had happened too, but she had been the one who caused it._

Barriss was waiting for her.

_She’d been behind her._

Ahsoka reached out for the cold air duct that waved wildly around the room and aimed it towards her friend.

_She’d cut it._

Barriss fell to her knees, clutching her head and screaming as the worm looked for relief from the cold.

_The same._

“Kill me, please.” Barriss begged.

_“I can’t.”_

That was what she had said before.

Ahsoka stepped forward, blade drawn, and plunged her lightsaber into Barriss’ chest.

The scene changed.

The cold air of the ship that had surrounded them was replaced by smoke and the scent of burning metal, burning fuel, burning bodies. Ahsoka withdrew her blade and stood up, looking around the carnage of the Temple bombing. _Her_ bombing. Except that it wasn’t.

“You should have listened to me.”

Ahsoka turned around to see Barriss standing before her, the hole Ahsoka had left in her chest still burning.

“It was only a matter of time.” Barriss took a step towards Ahsoka, still holding her gaze. “Though I think, in the end, I was wrong. The Republic wasn’t failing. It had already fallen.” She scoffed and raised a hand to the hole in her chest. “Just like me. Why are we the ones who survived?”

Ahsoka rolled over on the uncomfortable bench that passed for a bed in her prison cell. When she looked up, she saw a keycard on the floor outside of the ray shield. She muttered a thanks to her master before using it to unlock the doors.

When she rounded the corner, she was met with a hallway filled with the bodies of the Coruscant guard. She halted in her tracks, taking in the lightsaber marks that traced across them, and, finally, taking in the perpetrator at the end of the hall.

“Don’t!” Ahsoka called as Barriss slit the clone’s throat.

“They were infected with the Geonosian brain worms!” Barriss protested, letting the body slide to the floor. “I didn’t have a choice.”

“Yes, you did! The cold harms the worms, you didn’t have to kill them!”

 _That was not how that happened either_.

When she blinked, it was no longer the body of a clone slumped before Barriss, it was Barriss herself with a clone standing over her, holding a blaster to the side of her head. Ahsoka recognized the blue markings of the 501st, but not the clone himself. Not that she could have. The more she tried to focus on his tattoo, the most it shifted around; a tear drop, an elaborate triangular design, the symbol of the Republic, a five, nothing, a series of dots and lines. Ahsoka stepped forward before feeling the press of a blaster against the back of her head. She knew that if she turned around, she would find Rex standing behind her.

“Why?”

“Good soldiers follow orders.”

* * *

Ahsoka jolted awake, kicking off the light blanket as she sat up.

“I had the same dream.” Barriss was sitting on the bunk opposite her, her legs hanging off the side of the bed towards Ahsoka. “Which clones did you see? At the end.”

“The 501st, Rex.”

“I saw Commander Gree and the 41st.” She sighed, the gesture darkening her thin features. “You know, I never got to say goodbye.”

“Nobody did.” Ahsoka leaned back against the cold wall of the ship behind her, taking in her former friend. Prison had changed her. Her features had sunken in and she had allowed her hair to grow. Ahsoka resisted the urge to cross the room and smooth down the billows that had risen from her sleep. They weren’t on those terms of friendship anymore.

“I know. I’m going back to sleep.”

Ahsoka nodded and lay back down in turn, facing the wall of her bunk, hoping that further rest would take the nightmares away, knowing that it wouldn’t. Knowing that reality was worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AU where Ahsoka and Barriss end up on the run together following Order 66.
> 
> This is now my most popular fic, so thank you all for the love you’ve shown it so far! We’re nearly halfway done!


	17. No 16. A TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rex and Anakin find themselves doused with hallucinogenic powder while pursuing Asajj Ventress.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hallucinations  
> TW: None 
> 
> Hey guys! I fell into what I guess was some post-exam depression because I’ve been very tired and haven’t been able to focus on writing, but I’ll be catching up slowly! I’m not very happy with this chapter but I almost never am so I’m posting it anyways. (And I did fine, even good, on my exams so idk what’s going on but I’m alright.)

Rex flung his helmet to the ground as he choked on the mist he and Anakin had just been dosed with. Whatever type of spore it was, it was small enough to get through the filters of his helmet. And it was making him dizzy. Rex was vaguely aware that he was falling before he caught himself on a crate. He lowered his head against the cold metal for a moment in an attempt to clear it. 

When he raised his head again, the world had changed. He was no longer in the dim warehouse, but on a Venator. Each flash of the emergency lights was blinding, and the blaring of the alarm drove away all clear thoughts from his mind. Men rushed around him, their faces blurred in the red light. Rex tried to follow them but didn’t make it far before he stumbled to the floor. 

“Anakin?” 

Anakin coughed, waving his hands in front of his face to clear away the mist before him. When he opened them again the warehouse before him had changed into a dark hallway. He started down the hall, looking for Rex. He had just been beside him. Anakin heard his name echoing through the darkness. 

“Rex?” 

Rex spun around, pushing himself to his feet as he looked for the source of the shout. It had sounded like Anakin. When he turned back around the men who had once rushed past him were gone and the sirens had fallen silent. In their place, he heard labored breathing. 

“Anakin?” 

Anakin slid to a stop at the end of the hallway. The shout had come from behind him. He turned back around and cautiously made his way back down the hallway, halting when he stumbled across a metal crate. His lightsaber lay on it. He took the hilt in his hand and ignited the blade. 

“Rex?” 

Rex ran his fingers across the familiar body of his DC-17s. He could’ve sworn that the crate they lay on had not been there before. He drew them at the sound of his name echoing through the red lighting. The labored breathing was getting closer, and as it did it sounded less human and more mechanical. A dark figure began to approach from the end of the hall. 

“Anakin?” 

Anakin stopped as the crouching figure of the clone came into view. He couldn’t make out the color of the armor, nor it’s markings, in the light around them. A shot rang out in his direction, and he brought his blade up to meet it, reflecting it away from himself. Now that he was closer, he could see that it wasn’t a clone but a man in Mandalorian armor. He began to advance. 

Rex scrambled to his feet as the red-bladed shadow approached. He managed to land a shot against its shoulder before it was upon him, red blade flashing. He dodged, but felt a line of pain rip through his arm anyways. When he moved to get up, he found the red blade at his throat. He stilled, setting down his blasters and raising his hands before the figure. 

Anakin looked down at the kneeling Mandalorian before him. He could easily kill him with a single flick of the wrist. And yet. The Force moving between him and the figure felt familiar. Giving into the ache in his shoulder, he lowered his lightsaber and extinguished the blade, kneeling before the Mandalorian to get a better look at him. He reached over to remove the man’s helmet and found his hand pressing against skin instead. 

“Rex?” 

“Anakin?” 

Anakin’s hand fell to Rex’s shoulder, and Rex could feel his general reaching out to him in the Force. 

“You shot me.” 

“Well, you nearly cut my head off.” 

“Only because you shot me.” 

Rex reached over to lay a hand near the Anakin’s wound. “You had a red blade. Guess it was some hallucinogenic powder they dosed us with.” 

“Yes.” Anakin sighed. “And they’re long gone.” 

“Well then.” Rex drew his hand away and lay down on the ground. “We can’t get out of here in this state, or patch ourselves up, so how about we just wait it out?” 

Anakin scoffed, then lay down next to Rex, bumping his elbows against him. “What are we going to tell Kix when he asks about the injuries?” 

“As far as I’m concerned, we’re even, so I vote that we ran into Ventress and some droids.” 

“Wait, so I got shot by a droid and you survived an attack by Ventress?” 

“Yeah, something like that. The details are fuzzy.” 

“They will be after I finish with you.” 

Rex laughed in response and they fell silent as they waited for the effects to wear off, each silently apologizing to the other in the Force. 


	18. No 17. I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A reminiscing Kylo Ren is interrupted by a call for a momentary truce following the near extermination of the Resistance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blackmail | Dirty Secret  
> TW: None
> 
> For the record, I love the themes and concept of Reylo, but I disagree with nearly every canon thing that happened to get there.

“I could tell them, you know.”

He spun around to face her. He hadn’t heard her voice in weeks; not since Crait.

She was on the _Falcon_ , that much was clear, reclining with her legs up on some table out of his view with a look of confidence across her features. A look of arrogance. He wouldn’t have been surprised if she was about to tell him that she had sensed the lowering of his guard as he traced the lines of his scar, her scar, in the mirror. “I could tell everyone. Supreme Leader Kylo Ren nearly gave up his entire Order for a girl. Can you imagine what they’d think of you then?”

He made his way across his room, slinking down into a chair near where their worlds met. “They wouldn’t believe you.”

“Would they? Are you sure that they’d rather believe that a girl from Jakku defeated the Praetorian Guard and yourself in order to escape? But maybe that’s worse.”

His eyes wandered over her body. The wound on her upper bicep had formed thick scar tissue that looked nearly as painful as the wound had once been. She had come out of that duel relatively unscathed, thanks to him, considering the prowess of the Praetorian Guard. “Tell me, has the Resistance run out of bacta so soon or are they just stingy with its distribution?”

“Don’t change the subject.”

He stood and walked away from her, back into his room. He could feel her eyes burning into his back as he knelt beside his bed, sorting through one of the many drawers that sat beneath it. When he threw the bacta packs to her she nearly missed them, having to reach out into the Force to stop them from crashing to the floor. By the time she had recovered them, he had returned to his chair.

“Why?”

“The more beat up you look, the more likely your story sounds.”

She eyed the bacta suspiciously. “You do know that I’m just going to give these to the Resistance medics, right?”

“I’d be disappointed in you if you didn’t. Though I must insist that you take one for yourself.”

Her lips slunk into a satisfied smile. “Worried about me, are you?”

“I’d hate to kill you in an unfair fight.”

“I don’t think you need that last part; you’d hate to kill me.” She threw her legs off the table and stood up, reaching her hands towards her stomach as she did so. The sensation of bruised ribs flared up in his side before ebbing away.

“You need to rest.”

She bared her teeth at him in a snarl, but not a convincing one. The corners of her mouth still bore the ghost of her smirk. “Ready to kill me so soon?”

“I can sense your pain in the Force. Rest and heal so you’ll stop bothering me.”

“Because it’s all about you.” She looked down to the bacta packs in her hand then looked back to him. “Thank you.”

“Keep yourself safe, so that I can kill you fairly.”

“Stop sending your men after the Resistance, then we can talk about my health and safety.”

“If I did, you would keep my supposed affections for you a secret?”

“These medpacks won’t remain a secret. But I’ll consider keeping their source unknown.”

“How long should I stop my pursuit?”

“A month.”

That was reasonable. He could devote that time to tracking down the Wayfinder.

“Done.”

She looked down at the medpacks once more then back to him, the smirk tracing across her features once more. “If you break your promise, I’ll release the hologram I’ve been recording for the past few minutes.”

The true reason for her call.

Then she was gone, and he was left alone with a stunned smile across his lips and a feeling of betrayal and pride in his chest. He reached out for his comm, ignoring the still-ache in his chest from her bruises, and began to think of how to distract the First Order for a month.


	19. No 18. PANIC! AT THE DISCO

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With all distractors gone, Cal’s thoughts wander to old trauma and old wounds.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Panic Attacks  
> TW: Panic Attacks
> 
> No end of game spoilers in this one!

Cal jolted awake, reaching for the side of his face. The familiar touch of his scar greeted him and he rested his fingers over it as he willed himself to lay back down on his bunk. Just another nightmare, another memory, the two were inseparable. When he couldn’t will his heartbeat to slow down he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and made his way out of his cabin into the main living spaces of the ship. It was the middle of the night, at least for their circadian rhythms, and the ship was silent. He walked up into the kitchen, reaching into the Force to silent his footsteps against the metal floor as he located the kettle and tea bags.

When he had a hot mug brewing in his hands, he made his way down into the living room and sunk down onto the couch, setting his feet up against the table as he did when Greez wasn’t looking. His heartbeat had yet to slow to normal and he could feel the beating of his heart against the cup in his hands. He squeezed the mug, trying to absorb its warmth and calm, the love that had been put into making every contour of the clay into its current shape. He nearly succeeded until it brought back another memory, one that was his own. Another cup of tea in another mug, brought to him by the commander of the 13th, his commander, during a brief reprieve in the Bracca campaign. Cal closed his eyes in an attempt to fight back the tears that these memories always brought. Not because they were in and of themselves sad, but because of what would happen later.

He set down the mug as a hiccup of a repressed sob wracked his shoulders. But now it was too late and fighting it down was only making it worse. He brought up the neck of his shirt and stifled the next sob into the beaten fabric. He didn’t know why he was crying anymore. Whether it was for the loss of his innocence, the betrayal of the clones, or his own inability to process the events of his life. He was fine when he was busy and he could focus on his goals, their goal now, and let the past fall behind. But when things got quiet and the distractors were gone, there was nothing between him and the memories.

He didn’t know when he had pulled a knee up to his chest, but he found himself lifting his forehead from it at the light touch of a metal leg. BD-1. Cal let the tension in his arms drop ever so slightly, and the droid seized the opportunity to fling itself into Cal’s embrace. He didn’t know if the droid understood, but he clung to BD as he had just been clinging to his leg.

BD let out a soft series of coos and Cal nodded, clearing his throat in an attempt to rid the tension that had built up.

“I know. I’ll try.” Keeping a tight hold on BD-1 he reached out for his rapidly-cooling tea and began to take small sips of it, trying to focus on the flavor of the leaves on his tongue. It nearly worked, the warm liquid soothed his aching throat, but it couldn’t stop the shaking of his shoulders or the occasional tears that still fell from his drying eyes. When he was no longer dehydrated, the tears began to return and Cal resigned himself to another hour awake on the couch, clinging to his droid.

Then BD was gone, scuttling away to the back of the ship, and Cal was left alone. His shock at the droid’s action did more than the tea had, stilling his shoulders and drawing away his focus as he tried to think of why BD would leave him.

Just when the shock had broken, BD was scuttling back over to him, a just-woken Merrin following him, one of the poncho’s Cal had given her flung over her night clothes. “He said you’re in pain.”

Cal shook his head. “I’m fine.”

Merrin pulled the poncho tighter to her as she sat down beside Cal. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Cal shook his head, staring at the empty mug on the table, afraid to meet her gaze.

“Do you want me to leave?”

“No.” The word that had left his lips surprised him, but he knew it was the right one when she wrapped her arms around him and pulled him against her, tucking his head into the crook of her neck and pressing a hand between his shoulder blades. Even when his shoulders began to shake once more, and the fabric of her poncho began to wet under his face, she held him.


	20. No 19. BROKEN HEARTS

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bly finds himself in the same situation that he once put Aayla in when he returns to Felucia.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Grief | Mourning Loved One | Survivor’s Guilt  
> TW: Character Death, Depression
> 
> Meant to compliment No.5 but can also fit into canon.

It was fitting, Bly thought, that he would die from a shot to the back on Felucia. The rebels had managed to sneak up behind them and ambush the tanks, shooting both he and some of his men in the process. He could see the boots of his men running past him now as they pushed the line forward. Bly hoped that that he would die before the tanks came along and crushed him, if there were any still left.

A pair of boots stopped beside him, and Bly’s breathing shuddered as he was lifted into someone’s lap. He recognized them as Lieutenant Galle when he found the side of his face pressed against the man’s pauldron when his helmet was pulled away.

“I’ve got you, sir.”

Bly hissed as Galle’s hand pressed against the exit wound in his side. He hoped that Aayla hadn’t been in this much pain when he shot her. He deserved this. He deserved this pain for betraying her trust.

He hadn’t felt the weight of his loss for weeks after Order 66, numbly following orders as they moved to secure Felucia for the new Empire. But then it was over, and he was alone, and his world caved in. He’d been in the shower when it happened. He’d had his own quarters on their ship, his ship, with his own refresher. There was nobody around to watch him break. Bly couldn’t remember how it had begun, but it had ended with him lying on the floor of the shower and a drained water ration. He’d slept on that floor, too numb to move. Galle had found him in the morning, waking him up when he frantically searched for a pulse. Bly had found himself comforting Galle when the other man began to shake.

He’d run into Wolffe not long afterwards. Both of their legions had returned to Coruscant in the same week, allowing the men to catch up in the barracks during a period of downtime.

“Cody was sent straight to Kashyyyk.” Wolffe had told him. “Fox and Gree are dead. I heard Rex is dead as well.”

“Add me to that list.” Bly had scoffed. “I don’t plan on sticking around.”

He’d hoped that Wolffe would try to talk some sense into him or rib him about how desperate he sounded. He’d never expected his brother to sigh and say, “I don’t think any of us do.”

That had been the last time they’d talked.

Bly wished that he’d gone through with calling Wolffe last night. Instead, he bit back a cry as Galle’s armor brushed against one of the shards of metal in his back that had been sheared off the tanks by the bombing.

“I’m sorry.” Galle had taken off his helmet, revealing the desperate look in his eyes.

Bly fought through the pain to speak. “Galle, promise me something.”

“Anything.”

“After all we’ve suffered here, take this damned planet so that it will all be over.”

Galle nodded earnestly. “I promise.”

“Go.”

“I won’t leave-.”

“They need you. I don’t. I’ll be fine.” He wouldn’t. Even now the pain was fading away. Bly had seen enough death in his life to know that his was near. He knew that Galle would see it too.

Galle nodded sadly and lay Bly’s body back on the ground, setting his helmet beside him. “I’ll make sure the men are taken care of, Bly.” Then he was gone.

Bly didn’t close his eyes. Instead he chose to look up into the sky that was visible through the thick overbrush of Felucia’s forests. He remembered another time he had looked up into that sky, when he had held Aayla’s body in his arms and wished that he had died alongside her. He hadn’t. But maybe, he could pretend that the weight settling into his chest was her body as she lay across him. The thudding of his heart against the plastoid over his breast could be her drumming her fingers against him. He finally gave in to the heaviness that was sinking upon him and closed his eyes.

With his eyes closed, he could’ve sworn he’d felt the light brush of fingers across his cheeks and a familiar, soothing voice before he finally stopped fighting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Draft 1 was like "how many times can I misspell Felucia?" Hope I caught them all.


	21. No 20. TOTO, I HAVE A FEELING WE’RE NOT IN KANSAS ANYMORE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kix fights to keep his brothers alive on Umbara, but gives them peace when he cannot do so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Field Medicine  
> TW: Needles, Drug Use, Graphic Descriptions
> 
> I was too lazy to look up the Star Wars equivalent of morphine today.

Kix pushed himself up from the ground as soon as the bombing had ceased. Behind him, he could hear Rex and Fives similarly scrambling to their feet as well. That shot had come too close. A hand grabbed him by the back of his chest plate and pulled him back as the Umbarans sent another volley their way.

“Thanks, Rex.”

“You’re no good to the wounded if you’re dead. Stay alive and stay behind shelter!” Rex clapped Kix on the shoulder as he and Fives ran back into the line of fire.

All of Rex’s words were forgotten when another volley hit. Still sheltered by the tree, Kix watched as one of his brothers fell to the fire. Once it had momentarily ceased once more, he ran to the man’s side and fell to his knees beside him, pulling his medpack from his shoulders.

A chunk of the man’s torso had been taken out by shrapnel from a rock that had caught one of the blasts. Kix could see his lungs expanding and contracting through the missing flesh as he fought for air.

“Not doing so well, am I?” His brother scoffed weakly.

“Nonsense.” Kix found the small vial of morphine with ease. “Nothing a little bacta won’t fix.” He held up the tube so that the man could watch as he removed the cap and built up air in the needle before lowering it to his neck. The man didn’t flinch as Kix inserted the needle, but relaxed soon after Kix pressed down on the plunger. “I’m going to go check on the dying. I’ll see you soon, brother.” He recapped the needle then squeezed the man’s shoulder as he stood with his pack as he looked around for more fallen men. Once they had fallen, there was little that he could do for them but lessen their pain before they marched on.

By the end of the night, his hands were wet with the blood of his brothers. His blood. At one point, he had nearly been the one bleeding out on the ground. Then the men had found the rocket launchers and Kix had been saved the pain that he had freed so many men from today. He supported one of them now as they limped to the airbase that Fives and Hardcase had secured. He had splinted the man’s leg with the few bandages that he could spare and some of the harder flora laying around them from the splintered trees.

Kix brought him to the makeshift medbay and lay him down on one of the bare racks that had been cleared off for them. There he was able to piece together a better splint using some of the medical supplies the Umbarans had left behind. It still wouldn’t be enough. As he finished wrapping the bandages around the man’s leg he knew that there were some very good odds against them and that the leg wouldn’t set right. They never did.

He found the man’s comm and pressed it into his hands. “Comm me if you need anything before Coric arrives, okay?”

In the other half of the room, Kix went through his pack, discarding the empty syringes that had wound up back in there to make space for new, full ones. Once everything that had been used in the pack had been replaced, he reached for a hidden pouch in the lining of the bag and pulled out a half-empty morphine vial.

He didn’t have to search for a vein. He’d injected many things into the same vein on so many of his brothers that he knew its placement by heart. Kix had never liked needles. On Kamino, they never brought anything good to him or his brothers. But here, he could stand the cold press into his skin. He removed one of his bracers and rolled up the sleeve of his blacks just far enough that they would remain pulled back for the few seconds it took for him to press the needle into his skin and push down on the plunger.

The first time he had done it, he had closed his eyes as he felt the wave of calm wash over him. Now he was no longer so enamored with it and the needle had been removed and the area bandaged, covered, and re-armored before he allow himself to sigh and let his head hang for a few moments as the aches in his body drained away.

The makeshift medbay had been set up close to the makeshift barracks, and he didn’t have to walk far before he found himself beside his bunk. There he stripped off his bracer again, along with the rest of his armor, and lay down beside Jesse, pressing his back against his brother’s. Kix had his own bunk, but Jesse understood Kix’s need for human contact that didn’t end in death or pain.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Jesse asked.

“There’s nothing to talk about.” Kix whispered back. “Krell’s going to be the death of us all.”

Jesse didn’t verbally respond, but found Kix’s hand and gave it a light squeeze. Kix squeezed back before he withdrew his hand from Jesse’s and lay it down in front of him. Jesse didn’t know that Kix had already sought his comfort from elsewhere. He would’ve stopped him if he knew. Maybe that should have concerned Kix, but he didn’t let it. He just needed a way to sleep at night, and if the half-dose of what he gave to his dying brothers to ease their passing could wipe away that pain from his soul, he would use it. He would never be granted it in death anyways. Kix could save anyone but himself.


	22. No 21. I DON’T FEEL SO WELL

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rex and Ahsoka find themselves stranded on an ice moon after escaping from Separatist forces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hypothermia  
> TW: None
> 
> I know I’ve done a lot with these two, but, consider this: I love them.

Rex was awoken by the shaking of a small hand against his shoulder. He blinked his eyes open to see Ahsoka leaning over him, fear etched across her features.

She let out a muffled sob. “I couldn’t tell if you were breathing.”

“I wouldn’t leave you behind, kid.” He pushed himself upright in his seat. The seatbelt had worked to the best of its ability, but his head had still been slammed into the console during the crash. He wiped away the drying blood from his brow with one hand. “Where are we?”

“Some moon. At least we managed to lose the Seppies.”

“And our engines.” He pointed out as he undid the seatbelt and rose to his feet, his bruised ribs protesting the motion. His breath caught as he straightened up and Ahsoka’s hand darted out as if to steady him before she quickly drew back.

“We lost the comms too.” She said once he was fully upright. “Life support, everything.”

Rex noticed how tightly she had clasped her bare arms against her body. “What type of moon did we land on?”

“A cold one.” She shrugged, or perhaps shivered. Unlike Rex, she didn’t have a temperature regulating bodysuit. She had a sleeveless tunic and leggings. They had not been prepared for any form of extreme biome on this trip.

Rex reached for the clasp of his pauldron. “Go find the shock blankets in the medbay and bring them in here.” While she retrieved the requested blankets, he stripped off his armor. By the time she returned, he was standing in his blacks. Before the situation could take any form of awkwardness, he took one of the blankets from her and wrapped it around his shoulders before sitting down beside one of the consoles. He opened his arms towards her, and she wrapped her own blanket around her shoulders before she lay down against him, hesitation melting away with his body heat.

“I forgot you clones run hot.” She said.

“Fun little byproduct of our engineering.” He responded, wrapping his arms around her.

They sat in silence, listening to the wind howl around the ship, whistling through the cracks in the durasteel. Someone would come for them. Anakin would come for them. Rex had no doubt about that. It was only a question of when he would arrive.

An hour had passed in relative silence when Ahsoka began to shiver again. Rex knew that it had been coming. The temperature in the ship was slowly dropping with every passing minute. He was beginning to feel it through his blacks.

“Sit up.” He nudged her until she brought her body weight off of him, even the small motion difficult for her numbing limbs. She stared off into space as he unzipped the top of his blacks, closing her eyes when he brought her back down to his chest as she pressed against his still warm skin. Later he knew that she would be embarrassed over the immodesty of the situation, but they could deal with that when they got there.

“Do you think Master Skywalker will find us?” She asked sleepily.

“I know he will.” Rex promised. “And you’re going to be alive when he does.” He listened as Ahsoka’s breathing drew out into sleep. Rex tried to stay awake, watching over Ahsoka as he felt shivers begin to set into his own body.

He jolted awake to a shaking in his chest before he realized that it was the rapid beating of his own heart. He felt like he had just finished a run, not lying in a huddle on the floor of the ship. He reached down to take Ahsoka’s pulse and found her heartbeat to be just as rapid.

“Wake up. Ahsoka!” He shook her, but received no response. “Ahsoka!”

She let out a sound of worry. “Where are we, Rex? What happened?”

“It’s going to be alright, kid.” Rex pushed himself up so that he was sitting upright with Ahsoka leaned against him. “You’re going to be fine.” He slipped the top of his blacks off his shoulders and wrapped it around her, slipping her arms inside and zipping it up before he lay them back down, clutching the blanket around him.

“Are you cold?” He could feel the humming of Ahsoka’s word in his chest as she spoke against him.

“Not at all.” He lied. Perhaps it could be taken as the truth. Sweat was beginning to coat his chest as his nervous system went into overdrive to combat the lowering of his body temperature. Still, he could feel his heartbeat beginning to slow now that the shirt of his blacks had been removed. But he’d promised her that he’d keep her alive. Rex wrapped his arms around Ahsoka and closed his eyes, giving in to the heaviness that tugged at him.

* * *

Ahsoka was woken up by the sound of a lightsaber blade sizzling into the side of the ship. Good. Her Master had arrived.

“Rex-.” She stopped when she realized that she could barely hear his heartbeat under her lekku. Out of instinct, she reached up to his neck to take his pulse and managed to find a sluggish beat that matched the slowing of his heartrate through his cold skin. “Rex!” She searched the room for the shirt of his blacks so that she could place it back over him. Then she realized that she was wearing it. 

“Ahsoka!” Anakin’s voice echoed through the ship.

“Anakin!” She called back to him. She was relieved to hear multiple footsteps following the sound of her voice. Anakin scooped her up into his arms as soon as he, Obi-Wan, and Cody rounded the corner. She watched over his shoulder as Cody stripped off the upper half of his armor, struggling more than Rex had due to the design of the snowtrooper uniform, and opened the front of his blacks before he sat down and gathered Rex’s limp form into his arms, doing the same thing Rex had done to save Ahsoka. She didn’t realized how inflamed Rex’s skin was from the cold until she saw it pressed against Cody’s. 

Rex stirred weakly in Cody’s arms. “Ahsoka?”

“She’s alright, old boy. You’re both gonna be alright.” Cody looked up to Obi-Wan. “Tell medevac they can move in. I’ll stay with Rex until they arrive.”

“Cody, is-?” Ahsoka’s voice broke.

“I’ll keep him safe, Commander Tano. I promise.”

Ahsoka’s grip on Anakin tightened as he began to take her away. Looking back over his shoulder, she watched Obi-Wan reach for his comm as Cody wrapped the discarded blankets around Rex in a cocoon. With the momentary rush of adrenaline fading, she found herself falling back into unconsciousness. The last thing she saw before she closed her eyes once more was the beautiful, icy landscape of the moon that had almost killed them. 


	23. No 22. DO THESE TACOS TASTE FUNNY TO YOU?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thire watches over Riyo at a senatorial gathering after she receives another threat on her life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poisoned  
> TW: None
> 
> I lied about the end of Foxiyo stuff but you’re also getting some more Thire because he’s my favorite minor clone character.

Riyo resisted the urge to turn around as she laughed. She knew that Thire wouldn’t be laughing with her, he had no sense of humor, but she also knew that the action would be noticed and commented upon by her fellow senators and there were some fine lines to walk in the Senate. Her pro-clone attitude was accepted as long as she kept them out of her personal circle during gatherings such as this. Not physically, Thire was standing directly behind where she sat, she could feel his weight pressing against the back of the couch as he leaned forward, and his presence had been felt at moments such as when he fixed the waiters that encircled the senators with his helmet’s blank stare. But his mental presence must be ignored. She couldn’t have asked for his input on the discussion without another senator prompting. If it were anyone else she may have anyways, but Thire preferred to unassumingly blend into the background.

“A toast!” A Nautolan whose name she had yet to catch cried. “To the Republic!”

“To the Republic!” Riyo and the beings around her echoed before raising a glass to their lips.

“I heard that there was another threat against you, Senator Chuchi.” Padme said once the toast had finished.

Riyo looked over to her friend with a smile and a small shrug. “When is there not. You know how the Trade Federation is.”

“Oh I do.” Padme smiled back and looked above Riyo. “But I also know how capable the Coruscant Guard is when it comes to these matters.”

“It’s our duty, Senator Amidala.” Thire responded quietly.

“Say, Senator Chuchi. What happened to the red boy who’s usually following you around?” The Nautolan shouted, nearly sloshing her drink into the lap of the senator beside her.

“Commander Fox is the commanding officer of the Coruscant Guard. He’s busy I’m sure.” Riyo dismissed the question offhandedly.

“So why are you here, pretty boy?” The Nautolan shouted to Thire.

Riyo could practically hear Thire count to four as he took in a deep breath before responding. “Given the nature of past threats against the senator-.”

“Oh we know that!” Another senator broke in. “What’s so special about you?”

Riyo cut back in before Thire could. “Commander Thire is the head of security and the best marksman in the Guard.” She could feel her heartrate elevating as she defended her friend. “If there are any assassins here tonight, coming for any of us, he will dispose of them before any drinks can spill.”

Suddenly Thire’s hand was around hers, preventing her glass from tipping over as her hand began to shake.

“See? No drinks spilled.” She laughed uncomfortably, very aware of her increasing heartrate.

“If you will excuse Senator Chuchi.” Thire took her glass from her before walking around the couch to help her to her feet. She let him drag her out of the room, stumbling alongside him.

Her legs gave out from under her in the hallway and she crumpled to the floor beside him, suddenly aware of a burning in her stomach. Her mouth felt very wet from a rush of saliva. “I’m going to puke.”

Thire was kneeling beside her in a flash, pulling back her hair with one hand and holding the loose folds of her robes against her body as she doubled over retching.

“Get this drink analyzed.” She could hear Thire barking orders over her as her body heaved. “It’s all she’s consumed in the past half an hour.”

When Riyo sat back up again she was very aware of the flush of her cheeks and the cold sweat beginning to dot her skin. If Thire noticed he gave no indication as he swept an arm under her legs and stood, lifting her up into a carry. She could hear her own heartbeat in her ears as she rested her warm face against the cool plastoid of his armor. The air rushing by them also felt nice, and she nearly flung an arm out to enjoy it before she realized how delirious that would be.

“Thire, I’m not feeling too well.”

“I know.” She could hear the rumbling of his words through his armor. “Just hang in there. We’ve got enough antidotes in the basement to bathe in.”

“But you’ve never taken a bath.” She laughed, aware of how feverish she was but also unable to do anything about it. “Fox told me you can’t swim.”

“Fox is full of shit. Now stay with me and remember that so you can tell him I said that later.”

She was silent for a few seconds before she felt a tear trace down her cheek. “I didn’t tell him I love him.”

"He knows that you love him, Senator.”

“But I didn’t tell him that this morning. What if I die and he doesn’t know that I love him?”

“Fox knows that you love him, Senator Chuchi. Can I tell you a story?”

She nodded even as the lights dimmed around her and she felt herself being set down on some form of table. Thire stepped away for a moment to reach into a cabinet filled with labeled vials, setting his helmet down on top of it.

“When I was a captain, I worked under Commander Thorn. We deployed together on protection detail most weeks.” He pulled out a vial and began to search for a syringe. “We were on this lovely planet once, can’t remember the name, but it was this luscious jungle. Ran into a lot of wildlife there. Do you know what we saw?”

“What did you see?” She asked, watching him dip the needle of the syringe into the vial and withdraw some of the light pink liquid.

“We saw foxes. We ran into this den of foxes. They were every color you can imagine, Senator Chuchi.” He wiped down her forearm with an antiseptic wipe and readied the syringe as he searched for a vein. “But there was this one fox, this beautiful sunset orange fox, who came over to us. Do you know what Thorn did with this fox?”

“What did he do?” Between her current mental state and her focus on listening to Thire she didn’t notice the needle enter her skin.

“He sat down on the ground and opened his arms to it, like you would for a hug. And this fox came right over and lay down in his lap and let us pet it.” He removed the needle and searched for a small bandage to put over the mark it had left behind. “We pet that fox for close to ten minutes before it got up and left. Thorn was always good with animals.”

“Do you miss him?” Riyo asked quietly, almost afraid to voice the question.

Thire froze for a moment before a look of regret washed over his features. “Every day. I almost went to Scipio with him, you know.”

“I didn’t. I’m sorry.”

Thire gave her a sad smile as he bandaged her arm. “Speaking of foxes, let me call our Fox. He’ll want to see you.” He straightened up and stepped out of the room. Riyo could feel the cloudiness on her mind lifting and she ran her fingers over the injection site as she listened to the murmur of Thire and Fox’s conversation outside and thought about the multicolored jungle foxes that her love had been named for.


	24. No 23. WHAT’S A WHUMPEE GOTTA DO TO GET SOME SLEEP AROUND HERE?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Following Umbara, old nightmares come back to haunt Fives.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Exhaustion | Sleep Deprivation  
> TW: Depression

Fives reached for his blaster as he jolted awake and found himself aiming it at Tup, who had raised his hands over his head out of instinct. Fives lowered the blaster just as quickly as it had been raised. “I’m sorry.”

“You were screaming in your sleep again.” Tup lowered his hands but refused to step back. Instead, he laid a hand on Fives’ shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze.

Fives raised a hand to his face and squeezed the bridge of his nose between his fingers. With every breath he expected to breathe in the volcanic scent of Lola Sayu. The absence was anxiety inducing. He couldn’t form a response over the beating of his heart in his ears.

“Let me call Kix.”

“No.” Fives protested, meeting Tup’s gaze for the first time. “Don’t call Kix. I’m fine.”

“You’re shaking.” Jesse had snuck up behind Fives and now placed a hand on his other shoulder. “How much sleep have you gotten in the last week?”

“I’m fine.” Fives shoved their hands off his shoulders and stood up, swaying slightly from the sudden blood rush. When Jesse reached out to steady him, he pushed his hands away. “I just need some fresh air.”

He was relived when Jesse and Tup didn’t follow him out of the barracks into the empty hallways of the Venator. The night lights were on, their dark red hue lighting the hallways of the ship. He wandered the halls aimlessly until he found himself standing in front of the entrance to a small nook that he knew too well. The nook was tucked away behind the bridge of the ship, and if one squeezed between the metal support and the wall they would find themself in a small alcove, just large enough to comfortably fit two clones in ARC armor, that overlapped with the transparisteel windows of the bridge enough that both men could sit and look out into the stars and galaxies that passed by. Fives hesitated a moment before he entered. The blanket that Echo had stolen from the laundry was still there, untouched in months. Beside it was a book, a real paper book, on the Citadel. Fives didn’t know how Echo had gotten his hands on it. Books were a rarity, and so was paper, flimsiplast being preferred for most physical correspondence. Fives picked it up in his hands. He dared not open the book for fear of breaking it. But it was all he had left of Echo; his research into the place that had killed him. Fives sat there and held the book in his hands, running his fingers up and down its spine, until he heard the ship beginning to come to life again in the morning.

It turned into a routine. Pretend to go to bed, wait until everyone had fallen asleep, then sneak away to the nook and hold onto Echo’s book through the night before returning in the morning before his brothers woke. If anyone found the bags under his eyes concerning, they never mentioned it to him. Everyone had been in a bad state since Umbara. Dark bags and sleepless faces were no longer out of the ordinary. When Fives barely ate at meal times, the trauma was assumed to have resulted from his near execution under Krell.

Even on the nights he managed to fall asleep in his bunk, he was soon awakened by the nightmares that wouldn’t leave and found himself on the same path to sleeplessness, then to the nook. He had found himself in this routine for a week when Tup approached him. Fives was laying down to pretend to fall asleep when Tup walked over and sat down beside him on the bed.

“How did you get the nightmares to stop?”

Fives blinked for a moment as he processed the question. “What?”

“The nightmares. I have them too. They don’t wake me up, they haven’t since Kamino, but I still have them. How did you get them to stop?”

Fives floundered for a response. He couldn’t lie to Tup, the kid deserved better than that, but the truth was just as hard. He settled for a non-answer. “Do you want to sleep with me tonight?”

Any hesitation in the offer was gone the moment Tup nodded and practically flung himself to Fives’ side. Fives wrapped his arms around Tup and resigned himself to spending the night awake in bed. He managed to stay awake for most of the night, occasionally running a hand down Tup’s back when he felt his heartrate beginning to pick up or the twitch of his fingers as if around a blaster. He himself dozed off for an hour in the early morning before he was awoken by Kix reassembling his armor in the morning. Soon, Tup was stirring in his arms as well.

“How were the nightmares?” Fives asked quietly.

“Better. Gone.” Tup whispered. “Fives?”

“Yes, Tup?”

“Can I stay with you again?”

Fives considered the request. He knew that Tup had been close to Dogma before Umbara, but now that Dogma was gone he didn’t have anyone else to turn to. Fives would lose his hours with Echo’s ghost but, maybe, that was for the best. “Sure, kid.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just realized I haven't done anything with Echo yet so I hope y'all simp for Echo just as much as I do.


	25. No 24. YOU’RE NOT MAKING ANY SENSE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Imprisoned for her crimes, Barriss tries to sort fact from fiction as she finds herself deprived of her senses.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sensory Deprivation  
> TW: None
> 
> A prelude to No. 15, Into the Unknown.

She was weightless. The water that she had waded into wh **d** en **a** ev **y** er **s** ago had vanished to her senses. She wondered what would happen if she tilted her head back. Would she drown? Perhaps, she had already drowned. Perhaps she and Barriss Offee had separated. One sinking beneath the water and one floating above. She thought that she might like to drown. At least she would feel something. She hadn’t felt much in a long time. That much was clear. The time that had passed since she was put into this tank, if she had not been born in it, was unclear. Perhaps a lifetime, perhaps hours. Not minutes. She was certain that it had not been minutes.

Perhaps this was a punishment for her crimes. She was certain that she had committed some crime. Or perhaps, Barriss had committed a crime. She still wasn’t sure that they were not different beings. Barriss had been afraid of the stinging of the needle when she had received her tattoos, but She would give anything to cover her skin in the marks in search of sensation. She’d never known sensation. Though, perhaps, she once had. She could remember a time when she had held hands with other beings. There was a soft kiss on the cheek whose origin she couldn’t remember. Ahsoka? No. There was a soft brush of stubble there. She wondered if it was Commander Gree during one of those weeks when they stayed up and studied other cultures together. She wondered if they had kissed each other’s cheeks in an attempt to see what all the fuss was about. That sounds like something Barriss would’ve done. Barriss was always questioning things. Though, there was a time, a brief moment after her mind had been cleared from the brain worms, where she had felt Ahsoka kiss her forehead. Perhaps she had tried to recreate the sensation with her clone commander. What a fool she had been. Still, there was always the chance that she had never been kissed before and the sensations were simply her body trying to remember events that had never occurred to supplement the nothing it felt now.

She hadn’t seen Ahsoka since the trial. She had seen Gree when she was brought into the prison. He had been standing beside Commander Fox when she was led in, and his helmeted face had betrayed none of his thoughts. He hadn’t gone to see her. Ahsoka hadn’t gone to see her. Luminara had come once, but she had been too conflicted to come back again. How long had it been? M **y** o **e** n **a** t **r** h **s** s?

Her train of thoughts, if they could be called such, ended when the tank lid opened and she was blinded by the overhead lights.

“Here! I found her!” A familiar voice echoed.

“Then pull her out!” Another one.

Barriss felt a set of strong arms envelope her and pull her out of the tank. Before she could feel any shame in her nakedness, a long dress was being pulled over her body and a hooded cloak wrapped around her shoulders.

“We need to go, kid.” The second voice rang out again.

The first voice responded after the unmistakable beep of a commlink. “Kaeden, I hope you’re still in the speeder. Follow my tracking beacon. We’ll meet you midair in about fifteen seconds.”

Barriss stammered as she was dragged away from the sounds of fighting. The return of her senses was too much to handle; she couldn’t see a thing. Then she was in the air. For a moment she felt just as she had in the tank. Weightless and numb. Then her body slammed down into the seat of a speeder beside two other bodies. She let out a shout of pain as her arm collided with the back of a seat, feeling her skin scrape off against the metal supports. Then she laughed. It felt amazing.

She took a moment to breathe and relish the sensations that were returning to her body before she pushed herself up. Her vision was returning, and around her the lights of Coruscant flashed by as they sped through the city. On her left, she recognized the man who had cushioned her call as Anakin Skywalker’s clone captain. Which meant that the being on her right was-.

“Ahsoka.” Barriss whispered, afraid that just the invocation of her name would cause her to disappear.

“Barriss.” Ahsoka hesitated for a moment before she threw her arms around Barriss and each melted into the other’s hold.

“I am so sorry.” Barriss sniffled by Ahsoka’s lekku.

“I know, I know. We’ll talk about it later.” Ahsoka drew back and gave her friend a sad smile. Barriss knew what would come later. It had to. So for now, she threw an arm around Ahsoka and closed her eyes to focus on the sensation of the wind against her face. The past wasn’t going anywhere, but the present was slipping away faster than her restored senses could process and she intended to make the most of it while she could.


	26. No 25. I THINK I’LL JUST COLLAPSE RIGHT HERE, THANKS

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Echo makes a mistake at the Citadel and waits for Fives to save him from it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disorientation | Blurred Vision  
> TW: Graphic Descriptions
> 
> The dyslexia is strong today so please call me the h*ck out on any typos, I beg you. The letters won't stay in place for me to proofread right now. (Which is also why this is so short, sorry!)

“Echo, look out!”

Echo stepped aside, letting the blasterfire from the turret pass him by. His fingers clenched the handle of the shield before him. He hoped that Fives was right behind him. The last he saw of the generals, they were moving towards the turret to take it out. By the time he reached the shuttle, it should be gone. He kept the shield facing the turret before him as he waited for the strike of a lightsaber to cut through the barrel. He realized too late that it would never come.

There was something warm against his back, then a searing heat enveloped him.

He felt his head slam into the duracrete of the landing pad, the rest of his body following, or at least, he thought it did. He rolled for a few feet before he came to a halt, turned on his back. Looking up, he could see pieces of the burning ship falling around him in a fiery blur, but couldn’t find the strength to move out of their way. A piece of durasteel landed beside him, mere inches away from his head. He found that he didn’t care.

Echo thought that he heard his name screamed out from across the platform. Fives. Echo moved his lips to call out his brother’s name but found himself choking on ash instead. He brought his left arm up to cover his mouth as he coughed weakly in an attempt to clear his airways. It screamed in protest as his muscles shifted against a piece of debris that had lodged in his bicep. He wondered briefly how many more pieces just like it were embedded in his body before he pushed the thought away. His helmet was missing, his immediate priority would have to be assessment of head injury.

He pulled his left arm back and reached up to touch the side of his face that had been turned towards the explosion. Fractured cheekbone, a slight laceration across his jaw from when he had slid across the platform, then blood. Echo pulled his hand back from his ear to find it coated in blood. He didn’t dare reach back again.

Careful as to not start a flow of blood across his face, he turned slightly to the right to take in his arm. While his left arm was screaming in agony, he had felt nothing from the right and that was far more concerning. He quickly turned his head back to center, away from the sight of melted plastoid fusing with his muscles. It would have to be amputated. There was no doubt about that. If he wasn’t an ARC, decommissioning would’ve been on the table as well. He briefly considered looking down at his numb legs as well, but decided against it. If he was to bleed out here, he’d rather die without that knowledge.

But it was okay, Fives would be at his side any moment and everything would be okay. Even if he bled out in his brother’s arms, it would be okay.

Time was meaningless as he lay there, and only once the fires had begun to die down and the sound of approaching droids reached him did Echo realize that hours had passed. As the multitude of droids surrounded him, Echo hoped that Fives had run before he closed his eyes and gave into the darkness that had been gnawing at him.


	27. No 26. IF YOU THOUGHT THE HEAD TRAUMA WAS BAD…

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trapped inside his own mind, Echo relives his final moments of freedom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Migraine  
> TW: None
> 
> Told you I’m a simp for Echo. A continuation of No 25 with some dialogue from ‘A Distant Echo’.

“We have to get to the shuttle!” Echo had insisted.

Fives had nodded. “Let’s do it.”

Echo had held out an arm to hold his brother back when he stepped forward. “No, I’ll go first.”

“Echo, look out!” And he had. He’d dodged the blasterfire from the turret, trusting that General Skywalker and General Piell would disable it. He had been wrong. The shuttle had been destroyed, and his body had been ravaged by the fire.

He lay on the ground now, choking on smoke and hoping he wouldn’t bleed out before Fives came to him.

“Echo!” Fives’ cry echoed across the platform. Echo wondered if he would come to save him this time or if he would walk away again. He didn’t have to wonder for long. Fives’ silhouette became visible through the smoke and he froze when his eyes locked on Echo.

“Fives.” Echo whined. He hadn’t before, but maybe this time his plea would be heard.

Fives knelt down beside Echo, taking in the damage across his brother’s body. He reached a hand down to Echo’s ruined arm, and Echo squirmed under his rough touch.

“Fives, please.” Echo begged. “Don’t leave me.”

Not-Fives shrugged and stood up like he always did. “You’d only slow us down.”

“No!” Echo cried out as Fives stepped back into the smoke. “No, no.”

He knew that there was no use in begging. Nobody ever came to save him.

“Echo, it’s Rex. I’m here.”

Echo turned his head and for a moment he could’ve sworn he’d seen a control console through the smoke of the burning shuttle. But there was Rex, kneeling beside him.

“Rex. You came back for me.” Rex had never come for him before.

A pained look washed over Rex’s face and his lips moved but Echo couldn’t make out the words he’d uttered over the wave of pain that washed through his head. He gritted his teeth as the ache settled in behind his eyes, blowing away the arid smoke and replacing it with dark metals and stale, recycled air. But Rex was still there.

“What?” Echo managed before his eyes flickered around the room. This couldn’t be part of his vision. This didn’t look like the Citadel, at least, any part of it that he’d seen or mapped out. “What happened? Where am I?”

“It’s okay, Echo. You’re safe now.” Rex’s voice sounded much quieter than it had before. “Just sit tight, trooper. You’re going home.”

Echo raised a hand to his head and was surprised to feel the cold touch of metal against his forehead. It made the headache worse, so he lowered the arm again and was surprised when a droid sprocket arm entered his vision. He raised his left hand to his mouth and was thankful to find that it was still flesh.

“Hey, Echo.” Rex’s voice was soft as he lay a hand on Echo’s metal forearm. “We’re going to take you out of this machine. This may hurt.”

Echo nodded silently. Whatever pain it could bring couldn’t have been worse than what he had already felt. In the dreams he’d had, the one that his mind kept returning to, Fives had left him. At least one of those dreams had to be from reality, and he desperately hoped that it had been one where Fives had never come. Fives.

Echo raised his head to look around the room. There were unfamiliar men in grey and red uniforms, but, besides Rex, not a drop of 501st blue.

“Rex. Where’s Fives?”

Rex’s expression froze into one of despair, and Echo knew.


	28. No 27. OK, WHO HAD NATURAL DISASTERS ON THEIR 2020 BINGO CARD?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trapped by a collapsed building during an earthquake, Bly and Aayla take different approaches to their survival.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Earthquake  
> TW: Suicide

Bly looked up at Aayla with a smile as she approached him. She stepped into the empty room and knelt down beside him, draping an arm around his shoulders so that she could look down upon the datapad in his lap.

“Any word from the Jedi Council?”

Bly shook his head. “Nothing. I have some of the men working on getting their primary comm tower restored so that we can have a face to holo conversation, but it’s going to take several days.”

“Is that why you’re hiding in this closet?”

He turned his head towards her with a faux look of offense. “I am not hiding in this closet. I’m simply taking an isolated moment away from the men in an area previously used for storage to gather my thoughts.”

She leaned over and brushed a light kiss over his forehead. “Whatever you say, Bly.”

He leaned his head back and parted his lips in expectation, only to turn rapidly back to the datapad when it sounded a loud chime. “Another quake incoming. Big one.”

“Will it damage anything we’ve rebuilt so far?”

“Hard to say. Looks like the worst of it will miss us, but-.” He stopped when the building around them shook. “That.”

“Bly!” Aayla reached out for his pauldron as the building swayed beneath them.

“They’re meant to sway, _cyar’ika_.” He chided gently. But his grip tightened around her arm when the building swayed back to the other side and the floor tilted under them.

Aayla reached out to Bly as they slid against the opposite wall, throwing her arms around his shoulders and moving to cover his unprotected head with her body. When the sound of the building tearing itself apart from its foundations reached her, she reached out into the Force and willed it to create a shield between them and the walls collapsing in on them. It worked, until the ceiling caved in, sending debris raining down on the both of them.

When the building came to a halt, Aayla raised a hand to the back of one of her lekku and found that it came back bloody.

“Are you okay?” Bly’s voice was weak as he clutched a hand to his side.

“Just a graze.” She dismissed his worry as she moved to be closer to him, reaching a hand out to his side. He hissed as her hands pressed down over his. “What about you?”

“Some duracrete hit me on the way down. Think I broke a rib.” He shrugged, then flinched.

“What is the point of wearing armor if you’re just going to hurt yourself anyways?” She shook her head at him in exaggerated disappointment as she reached into the Force to feel the injury. “Fracture.” She decided.

“How far down are we?”

She redirected her focus in the Force upwards, feeling along what had been floor and ceiling supports until there was nothing to be felt. “You don’t want to know. And it doesn’t look like we’re receiving fresh air.” She sighed and ran a hand back over the laceration on her lekku. The soft skin had broken open easily, but the bleeding was beginning to slow down. She looked back to Bly. “What are you doing?”

“Clone protocol states that in this form of situation, all possible air reserves are to be reserved for the Jedi.”

“Damn your protocol!” She cried.

Bly’s expression didn’t waver. “I’m sorry. I love you, Aayla.”

She lunged over and pushed the blaster rifle out from under his chin, beginning to sob when she heard the blaster go off and the blast hit the wall behind them. “Don’t, don’t you dare leave me.” She buried her face into the crook of his neck where plastoid gave way to fabric as she wrenched the blaster from his hand.

She felt tears dripping onto her lekku as Bly hesitantly wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her closer. “I can’t let you die if there’s anything I can do to save you.”

“And you think I feel any different?”

“I’m going to die eventually, love. Let me die for you.”

“No.” She pushed herself up so that she could look him in the eye. “The future doesn’t matter. Right now, our fates will be the same.”

Bly closed his eyes as she bent over to kiss him. It felt wrong given the gravity of the situation, but it brought her comfort to run her fingers across his golden cheekbones and feel the life still living under her touch.

“We’re both going to make it out. I promise.” She lay her head back down upon his chest and held his hand tightly in hers as they waited for rescue.


	29. No 28. SUCH WOW. MANY NORMAL. VERY OOPS.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pinned down, Jesse thinks back on the events leading up to Order 66.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Accidents  
> TW: Character Death, Graphic Descriptions
> 
> Can’t leave Jesse out of all the 501st angst!

Jesse groaned as he came back to consciousness. Rex. Ahsoka. What had he done?

He tried to move, but found a heavy weight across his back holding him down. But he was laying on his side. Through his back. Jesse brought his hand to his torso to feel the barrel of a starship’s gun poking through the soft tissue of his stomach. So, this was how he would die. His brothers had already died. He could hear groans around him in the hanger, even over the rushing wind of the moon’s atmosphere, but the bodies that he could see were still.

He hoped that Ahsoka’s body was not lying among them. Rex had made it to the Y-wing, but she had been there on the floor of the hanger with them. And he had shot at her.

Jesse let his hand fall back to the durasteel beneath him. There was a wet sound as it landed. He was bleeding out. He panicked for a moment, wondering if he would drown in his own blood in his helmet before he realized that the pain was not in his lungs. He would be able to breathe and he would stay alive until the very end.

Perhaps it was what he deserved. He’d fired on the man that he would’ve died for, his closest friend since he lost everyone he had fought beside. First Hardcase, then Fives, and finally Kix. Kix had gone missing in action. One moment he was there, at Jesse’s side, then the next Jesse was alone. They’d never found his body. Jesse hadn’t been able to hold it together after that. He’d been glad when they were deployed to Yerbana; the war had kept his mind off Kix, even as Jesse found himself missing the presence at his side. But Rex had been there with a gentle hand on his shoulder and a quiet, comforting presence. Then they’d been deployed to Mandalore, and Jesse had hoped for death at the hands of Darth Maul. He still did, now. It would have been better to die a soldier then than it was to die a traitor now.

He still didn’t know why he’d done it.

It had to have been an accident, some fluke in their programming that caused them to forget everything they’d once known about their former padawan, and then their commander. Maybe they’d been exposed to some chemical on Mandalore. Maybe they’d always been a ticking timebomb.

Kix would know.

After Fives’ death, Kix had changed. He’d been one of the last men to see Fives, both over Ringo Vinda and on Coruscant. He’d been the last clone to treat Tup. He refused to accept the official reason for either of their deaths. He would know why they’d done this.

Jesse selfishly wished that Kix was here, even while he was thankful that he was not. He refused to believe that Kix was dead. He was alive, somewhere, and he would be saved from this death. And yet, if he were here, he would’ve been at Jesse’s side, trying to comfort him even as he himself was dying. If Jesse closed his eyes, he could imagine that Kix was lying beside him, telling him that everything would be alright. He would’ve believed him.

The Venator lurched and he cried out in agony as the starship shifted with it, moving the gun barrel that impaled him. He clutched at it with both hands in a vain attempt to hold it steady, but the metal was slick with his blood and there was nothing he could do. Instead he let his hands fall limp before him as he gave in. It couldn’t be much longer until impact.

Jesse liked to think that Kix was still alive, but now, as the time between his breaths shortened and they became shallower, he hoped that Kix was dead, and waiting on the other side to catch him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Friendly reminder that there was blood on Jesse’s helmet in the finale!


	30. No 29. I THINK I NEED A DOCTOR

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After suffering serious injuries at the hands of the droid army, Wolffe finds himself on the road to recovery.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Intubation | Reluctant Bedrest  
> TW: Mentions of Death

Wolffe lay prone on the ground waiting for the droids to finish him off. At this point, he didn’t know where his injuries began and ended, but he wanted them to be done. The ship was lost. If General Plo was wise, and he was, he would be evacuating all the men and leaving before the droids slaughtered them all. If he was wise, he wouldn’t come back for Wolffe. He was wise, he wouldn’t.

Wolffe and a small squad had tried to hold the droids forces off so that his men could make it to the escape pods. They had been successful until the thermal detonator. One of his ARCs had thrown himself in front of Wolffe before it detonated. That was the only reason Wolffe was still alive right now. Dying, but alive. The ARC was dead. Everyone else in his squad was dead. Wolffe would soon join them. He could hear the droids approaching now, looking for clones to finish off. The pain would be over soon.

The sounds of a commotion reached him, but he didn’t have the will to lift and turn his head towards it. He could hear a lightsaber. They hadn’t left. As he closed his eyes and gave into the pain, Wolffe wished that they had and hoped that they hadn’t compromised their escape for a dead man.

* * *

The sounds reached him first. A steady beeping of a heart rate monitor, the hiss of air. Then the sensations. A hand wrapped around his, a steady stream of cold entering his arm, the sensation of suffocation. He began to choke without losing breath as he fought the sensation. Then there was a hand at his throat and his gagging slowly subsided as his brother gently stroked the soft tissue under his jaw.

“It’s okay, Commander. Just relax.”

Wolffe slowly opened his eyes to see Boost leaning over him and the end of a tube sticking out of his mouth. He met Boost’s gaze with one of alarm.

“You’ll be okay, sir. It’s just a precaution. You-.” Boost hesitated for a few moments before he continued. “You stopped breathing.”

Wolffe raised his free hand, the one that Boost had been holding, to his forehead and brought it back down with his thumb and pinky extended.

“The medics didn’t say. They were pretty shaken by the entire incident.”

Wolffe signed the word ‘incident’ back to Boost with one hand and a quizzical look on his face.

“You died, sir.”

Wolffe let his hand fall back to the bed.

“We all thought you were gone. I don’t know how they managed to get you back.”

Wolffe reached for Boost’s hand once again, giving it a tight squeeze, glad that he was unable to say anything. He didn’t know how he could comfort his men over his own death. He’d never thought about it, their reaction to his absence, it’d never occurred to him that it would be his to fix, or even that they would care. They’d lost so many brothers in this war, what was one more?

Unable to form the full signs due to the series of tubes coming out of one arm, Wolffe pulled his hand back from Boost’s and slowly spelt. “H-O-W M-A-N-Y T-I-M-E-S?”

“I don’t know.” From the look on Boost’s face, Wolffe didn’t think the medics would want to remember either.

Wolffe raised a hand to his throat and imitated a jerking motion.

“Let me ask.”

Boost walked away to find a medic and Wolffe lay his arm back across his stomach and allowed his thoughts to wander. He, Sinker, and Boost were all that remained of the original Wolfpack. It had almost become just been Sinker and Boost. Of course Boost would be broken up over it, that didn’t mean that the rest of the men were. Even as he thought that, he knew his assumptions were wrong. The three of them were seen as invincible by the men and, besides, he was their commander. No one wanted to watch him fall.

Boost walked back over, shaking his head. “There’s still some minor surgeries they need to conduct.” He perched on the side of the bed beside Wolffe and took his hand. “Rest, Commander. I’ll stay with you.”

Wolffe sullenly took Boost’s hand again and forced himself to relax back into the pillows behind him. He would have hated to admit it, but his time awake had worn him out. He closed his eyes and squeezed Boost’s hand tightly as he waited to slip back into unconsciousness.


	31. No 30. NOW WHERE DID THAT COME FROM?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cody tells Rex of a new Separatist weapon. Later, Rex comes face to face with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Internal Organ Injury  
> TW: Character Death, Graphic Descriptions, Blood
> 
> This is the character-killing finale of this fic. Tomorrow’s will be kinder (but not too kind because it will still be whump). But I refuse to end this fic on a depressing note.

Rex slipped into the briefing room, hoping that his absence had yet to be noted. He would’ve been more informed if a certain general hadn’t wanted Rex’s last-minute advice on strategy. Not that Rex didn’t want to discuss how they were going to win, but he’d rather have done it before the men were assembling to leave.

“… The Seppies have been rolling out a new experimental detonator.” Cody held out a holoprojector in his hand with the image of a smooth, metal cube with a set of eyes on each face. “Droid circuitry, if it recognizes you it will detonate.” The image in his hand changed to the beginning of the explosion. “This device is designed to send out shrapnel in a ten-meter radius on each side. If you are within ten meters of this device when it explodes, you will die, and it will hurt the entire time you are dying. Am I clear?”

Good, Rex hadn’t missed the fun part of the briefing after all.

“Sir, yes, sir!” The chorus of voices rang out.

Cody nodded and the hologram disappeared. “Dismissed. Prep your gear, we set out in five.”

Rex waited for the gathered men to clear the room before he approached Cody, who had gathered the 501st and 212th medics around him. “…I know what I’m asking you to do is difficult at best, but you can’t place yourself in a vulnerable position for these men. If you can ease their passing, then do so, but this bomb was designed to leave no survivors.” Cody looked over to meet Rex’s gaze then turned back to the small group around him. “Keep yourselves alive.”

The medics nodded and dispersed, allowing Rex to approach Cody. “You’re not fooling around today, Codes.”

Cody shook his head with a sigh. “I shadowed General Kenobi to a test site for these things. I nearly lost my lunch. Some men are going to die a very painful death today.”

“They do every day.” Rex clapped his hand against Cody’s shoulder. “Come, the generals will be looking for us.”

For a moment, a feeling of dread washed over Rex. Then it was gone, and he and Cody began to slowly make their way over to their generals.

* * *

“Stop!”

Rex heard Cody’s shout ring out across the battlefield and turned to see his friend running towards a shiny. Then there were two explosions, one much closer than the other, and Rex fell to the ground as dirt rained over him. When he pushed himself back to his feet there was no sign of Cody or the shiny where they had stood.

Fighting down panic, Rex began to push forward towards their last position. He scrambled over the crest of a small hill to see Cody lying at the bottom of the slope. The shiny’s body lay further away, the white armor completely bloodied and still. Rex slid down the slope to Cody’s side, kneeling beside him and removing both of their helmets as he took Cody’s body in. He wished he hadn’t. Rex had seen the inside of his own chest spilling out onto the battlefield from the bodies of his brothers before, but he’d never imagined he would see Cody’s. Rex reached down before he hesitated, his hand hovering over the mass of ruined flesh and organs that had been shredded with broken plastoid and shrapnel. A few of Cody’s ribs had been broken. Rex tore his eyes away.

“The shiny.” Cody whimpered. “Did he…?”

Rex reached for Cody’s hands and squeezed them tight between his. “He’s okay. You took the worst of the blast.”

“Good.” The word gurgled in Cody’s throat and Rex placed a hand behind Cody’s neck, bringing his head forward so he could spit out the blood that was pooling in his mouth.

“Let me get a medic.”

“No! No. Please, stay.”

“Cody, I can’t help you.”

Cody smiled through bloody teeth up at Rex. “Just talk to me, please.”

Rex nodded even as a tear slid down his cheek. “I’ve been thinking about Kamino a lot lately. Do you remember when we used to go sit on the roof of the training facility? I miss those times. We’d go up there at night and talk about what we thought the Jedi would be like when they came for us.”

Cody made a weak gurgling noise. Rex couldn’t tell if it was in response to him or to the pain, or if it was Cody’s body fighting to stay alive as long as it could.

“Remember how we thought that they would be serious warriors? No nonsense types who had all the answers? How wrong we were. And I am so glad that we were wrong.”

Cody’s eyelids were beginning to flutter. His body shook as it tried to take in a deep breath. The attempt ended before it began with a great sucking noise and he was thrown into a weak coughing fit that left bubbles of red froth on his lips.

Rex leaned down and pressed his forehead to Cody’s. “Rest, brother.”

“Stay?” Cody’s request was barely a whisper, muffled by the thick blood that sat between his lungs and his lips.

Rex raised his head to meet Cody’s gaze. “Til the very end.” Rex slid his arm under Cody’s neck and pressed their heads together once more, supporting Cody’s head with his arm. With his other hand he squeezed Cody’s hands firmly. “Rest.”

Rex listened to the wet, sucking rattle of Cody’s breathing for a few seconds before he began to hum. He didn’t know the name of the song he was humming, nor what the lyrics were, but he did know the story. A soldier asking for a final dancing song before he went to war. He had heard Cody sing it before, back on Kamino and during the war. He wished now that he’d asked for the name.

He didn’t know when Cody had died or how long it had taken. Rex only knew that there was a moment when he stopped humming to breathe and was met with the sound of silence. He waited with bated breath to hear any signs of life in his brother, in his friend, but found none. Rex made a strangled noise as he tried to bite back a sob. He was still in the middle of a battle. He didn’t care. Keeping his head pressed against Cody’s, he wept, allowing his chest to rise and fall in great sobs. Let the droids find him, let them kill him.

Rex didn’t know how long he had knelt over Cody’s body, only that when the sobs began to subside, the sounds of battle were fading. It sounded like the Republic had won. Rex would not be executed by the droids today. He let go of Cody’s hands and sat up, ignoring the ache in his back as he took in Cody’s face for the last time. He ran a finger over Cody’s scar before he leaned over once more and planted a light kiss against Cody’s forehead. He remembered the time that Cody had done the same for him. Rex had come to him with a newly painted helmet with jaig eyes and Cody had brought their foreheads together before planting a light kiss on Rex’s. That had been the last time that they had truly been happy.

Rex slowly rose to his feet, and put his helmet back on, hiding the tear tracks that stained his cheeks. He knelt over one last time to take Cody’s helmet from the soil and tucked it under his arm. Later, he would ask for a piece of Cody’s armor to blend with his own. But, now, Rex slowly turned away from his brother’s body and began to walk back to the Republic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just do want to note that the kisses are meant to be taken platonically. I personally think that whatever interpretation a reader takes of my work is the best one, but I also feel that platonic displays of affection are important and too often overlooked in popular media.


	32. No 31. TODAY’S SPECIAL: TORTURE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Left to die, Boba Fett refuses to do so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Left for Dead  
> TW: None
> 
> Today’s Google search included sarlacc pit anatomy. These things are weird, y’all.

It burned.

Acid, corroding acid snaked its way through fabric and ceramic plating alike until it burned against his skin. It had yet to soak into his helmet, but it was only a matter of time.

It had taken time. The acid hadn’t stung at first, it had taken several hours for it to penetrate to his skin, then several more for its concentration to increase until it began to slowly eat away his flesh. Given more time, it would begin to creep under the beskar plates of his armor until it reached the soft organs beneath it. If dehydration didn’t take him first, and the rudimentary survival kit in his suit would ensure that it did not, he would be alive to feel it.

Not that he needed the survival kit now. The sarlacc would keep him alive as long as it could, his body strung out and burning for years. A century. A millennium. Even now, the tentacles that would save him were beginning to snake around his body, looking for a soft spot to penetrate. Maybe they wouldn’t be able to, and he would be allowed to die. But Boba knew he wasn’t so lucky. His armor would hold for now, hold them off for now, but time was ultimately on the wrong side in this conflict. Not that time had ever been on his side to begin with.

But his armor, his weapons, his mind? They had always been there for him.

With agony, he pushed himself onto his side, then stomach.

He began to crawl.

Every movement burned. His skin burned, his muscles burned, his mind burned, but his mind burned the brightest and it burned for freedom. His gauntlets were spiked, and he used those spikes now to pull himself up the stomach wall of the sarlacc even as it thrashed underneath him, trying to strike him back down into the pit with its internal tentacles. He could see the beak now, opening and closing above him as the sarlacc fought to keep its meal. It had eaten enough today.

One half of his jetpack still worked.

He activated it now, sending him flying up into the beak of the sarlacc as he unleashed a torrent of fire from his gauntlet, sending the beak flying open to escape the flames. Once he was through the beak, he turned the fire on the tentacles surrounding the mouth of the pit, causing them to shrink away. He was free. Barely in control of his flight, but free.

Boba rolled with the landing, letting himself come to rest where his momentum stopped in the cold sand. It was now night, and the galaxy shone above him.

He slowly raised his hands to his head to remove his helmet, letting it fall to the ground beside him and breathing in the cold air of the night. He kept his hands from his skin, afraid to spread the acid across his features. Perhaps it already burned there and he didn’t know it. That didn’t matter. He was alive.

Kamino was up there somewhere. It would be visible from Tatooine, just as Tatooine was visible from Kamino. He could remember seeing the orange planet on nights with his father on the roof of the training center when they looked up at the stars. Now, he had no one to tell him which of the bodies above him was which. He hadn’t in a very long time.

The acid was burning deep into his skin, but exhaustion burned deeper. Boba closed his eyes, and let himself fall into sleep, victorious.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I acknowledge that I ended many of these with someone falling asleep, and I also have no defense for myself for doing so and I will likely continue to do so in the future.
> 
> Thank you all for reading! This has been a very good writing challenge for me. I feel like I’ve learned a lot about my writing style over the course of this past month and what types of stories are the most compelling from your comments and reactions, so thank you for hopefully making me a better writer!


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